


If I Was a Flower Growing Wild and Free

by EndlessRain



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Adoption, Alpha Castiel, Alpha/Omega, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Human, Coming of Age, F/F, Growing Up, Juno AU, M/M, Mpreg, Omega Dean, Omega Verse, Pining, Teen Pregnancy, discussions of abortion, discussions of rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-14
Updated: 2014-01-09
Packaged: 2018-01-04 14:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 25,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1082142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EndlessRain/pseuds/EndlessRain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In between wondering if he's ever going to see his dad again, and worrying about Sam, Dean Winchester manages to find time to sleep with his best friend and get pregnant, just in time for his junior year. This is the tale of teenage woes, growing up, and learning to see the world (and himself) a little bit differently.</p><p> </p><p>Based off of the movie Juno with a side-dish of omega!verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fall

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Barry Louis Polisar's "All I Want Is You".

It started with a chair. 

He stared at the abandoned worn-out recliner, some of the old leather peeling off the seat. It was tossed out on the side of the road, ready for men in garbage trucks to take it away. Why the fuck would Missouri want to get rid of it? 

He took a sip of his Sunny-D.

The chair that Dean Winchester, captain of the wrestling team, president of the sci fi club, homecoming prince two years in a row, and notorious flirt, got pregnant in. Or at least, he thinks so. (He could totally not be pregnant, and that would be super cool, actually)

More specifically, got pregnant with his best friend in. Whoops. 

_Dean peeled off his boxers, and glanced up nervously at Cas, who was sitting in the chair, looking equally as anxious. Tip-toeing across the room, he bit his lip, and took in his best friend in all his ridiculous glory. Sure, he’d only been fantasizing about this since middle school, but still. Who gave Cas the right to be so fucking hot?_

_Hovering over Cas’s legs, Dean reached behind himself, but Cas grabbed his wrist.  
“Let me.” He whispered._

_A few of the butterflies torturing his stomach flew out his throat, and Dean blew a nervous breath. “Okay.” Why the fuck was he so nervous? He’d done this before, Jesus. Loads of times, even._

_But this was Cas._

_Two fingers gently moved inside him, and he felt a scratchy face kiss his neck. God, did he ever shave? What sixteen year-old had this much stubble? Castiel Novak, that’s who._

_“Did you know I’ve wanted this for a long time?” Cas asked._

_No. Of course Dean didn’t know that. Why would Cas want him? It was probably one of those things where people said things they didn’t mean during sex like You’re The Best I’ve Ever Had and I Love You._

_“Yeah.” Dean lied._

_“Wizard.”_

Dean blinked away the memory as a yappy dog reminded him that he was actually still on Earth. “Shut the fuck up, Banana, Jesus.” Dean muttered, taking another sip of his Sunny-D. It was the liter-size, the kind John used to buy when he was a kid, before he dropped him and Sam off at Bobby’s.

He turned back to the sidewalk, but not before glancing at the shitty recliner one last time. Dean was pretty sure it was the most magnificent piece of discarded furniture he’d ever seen.

Making his way back through town, he realized he had to pee again. Good, he could take another fucking pregnancy test.

The drugstore bell chimed, and Dean scowled at it. Why the fuck is that even there? If he really wanted to announce his presence when he entered a room he’d just say something. 

Gabriel, the recently-appointed assistant manager grinned at him. 

“Deano! Back for another test? Or are you just here to see my beautiful face?”

Dean rolled his eyes. “I think that last one was defective, man. It looked more like a division sign.”

Gabriel didn’t look convinced, but he handed him another box anyway. “Make it quick, Winchester,” he said, setting the bathroom key on the counter. “Oh, and make sure to pay for that shit. It’s not yours just because you marked it with your urine.”

A liter-sized Sunny D’s worth of pee later, and Dean was standing back out in the middle of the store.

“So, I’m I gonna be an uncle, or what?” Gabriel asked, standing on his tip-toes to peer over Dean’s shoulder.

“Back off, shortie, nobody is anything yet.” Dean pushed him away.

“Geez! Just trying to see if I need to start picking out baby stuff!” Gabriel protested, holding up his hands.

“Why would _you_ be buying baby stuff?”

Gabriel smirked. “It _is_ my brother’s kid, right? You and Cas finally bumped uglies?”

Wonderful, Dean was about to find out if he was pregnant or not, and he was doing it with Gabriel fuckin’ Novak, the World’s Biggest Bag of Dicks. 

“That’s none of your business, dude.” Dean said, shaking the pregnancy test. That can’t be right, it just can’t. _Fuck._

“That ain’t no etch-a-sketch. This is one doodle that can’t be undid, homeskillet.” Gabe said. “Hey, so what’s the verdict? You preggers?”

“Don’t matter. It’s not staying for long.”

Gabriel’s grin vanished.

“You’re gonna…?”

Dean shrugged indifferently. “What else do you expect me to do with it? I’m sixteen, man.” He tried to not let his voice break. _Jesus,_ he better not start crying. Not in front of Cas’s deadbeat older brother. 

“Cas is gonna be heartbroken.”

Dean raised an eyebrow, “You gonna tell him?”

Gabriel held up his hands again. “Hey man, that’s your business.”

“You're damn right it is.”

***

“Yo-yo-yo-giggidty-yo.”

“I’m a suicide risk.”

“Dean?” It was Jo, Dean’s oldest friend outside of Cas. He didn’t really want anyone know about it, but he needed to talk. 

“I’m pregnant.”

Jo laughed, and Dean scowled. What the hell? Why did everyone always think Dean was joking about everything?

“I’m fuckin’ serious, Jo. Don’t laugh.”

Jo was quiet for a minute, and Dean almost checked his phone to see if she was still there. 

“Are you… are you sure?”

“Yes I’m sure!” Dean exploded. Remembering that Bobby and Sam were home, he lowered his voice. “I’ve taken like, three pregnancy tests.”

“How did you even generate enough pee for three pregnancy tests?”

“I drank a shit ton of Sunny-D, is that okay with you?” Dean snapped. “You’re being shockingly cavalier about this.”

“Shit.”

“...yeah.”

“No, I mean like, _shit_. Shit, Dean. Shitting shit.”

“There we go, that was kind of the reaction I was hoping for.”

“Why weren’t you… I mean… you’ve been getting heats since like, ninth grade. Don’t you take birth control or something?”

Dean stared up at the ceiling, Robert Plant staring back at him. He sighed. “Yeah, Jo. I was.”

“So… what happened?”

“I forgot, okay? I was supposed to pick up my refill like three weeks before it happened, but there was a Red Dwarf marathon and I got a little distracted, and it threw off my hormones or something. I don’t know. The point is, I got a bun in the damn oven.”

He could hear Jo flipping through a magazine. “Are you going to go to Havenbrooke or Omega Now? I think you need a parent with you for Havenbrooke.”

“Omega Now, I guess. Hey, can you help me with something?”

***  
Castiel slammed the door to his house, only to become face to face with Dean Winchester. Or rather, face to chair.

Dean was casually lounging in a leather recliner, feet hanging over the armrest, and grinning lazily. Oh god, it was the recliner that they… _god._

“Hey, babe.” He winked.

Cas closed his eyes. He hated it when Dean flirted with him as a joke. In fact, Dean flirted with everyone as a joke. It didn’t bother him when his friend batted his eyelashes at random girls and guys because he knew it didn’t mean anything. When he said shit like that to Cas, it made his stomach flip and he got all sweaty. 

A hoard of runners clopped past, their sneakers smacking the cement in unison. He fiddled unnecessarily with the ties on his running shorts.

“I’m supposed to be running.” He said, stupidly.

Dean nodded. “So, guess what?”

“What?” Cas never quite knew what Dean was going to say. 

“I’m pregnant.”

Well, he didn’t expect that. 

Castiel felt like all the air was punched out of his lungs. How is that even possible? Wasn’t Dean taking birth control like any other omega who didn’t want to mate? After years of being desperately in love with his best friend, they finally had sex, and _this_ had to happen?

“So uh, what are you going to do?” He was going for casual, but he was coming off more awkward than anything. 

Dean pushed back the chair, and stood up, shrugging. “I don’t know, man. I guess I should probably nip it in the bud, right? I’ve heard that pregnancy often results in an infant.”

Dean was always saying obvious shit like that, and Cas was finally at the point where he could recognize his sarcasm and even play along.“Right. That’s typically what happens when our parents and teachers get pregnant.”

Dean peeked at his friend from the corner of his eye, the way he does when he wants to gauge a reaction without looking lame. Dean spent a lot of time pretending that he didn’t care, but Cas could see beneath that.

“So...that’s cool with you then?”

Cas blinked. “Yeah. Yeah, wizard. You have to do what you think is best, Dean. Take care of yourself. Do you want me to drive you to the abortion clinic?”

Dean winced at _abortion clinic,_ but then waved the suggestion away. “Nah, I’ll take the bus, and have Jo pick me up after.”

Cas never knew what to say in _any_ situation, much less this one. 

After an awkward pause, Dean slung his backpack over his shoulder and picked up his bike. “Well, I’ll see you in chem, dude.”

“Okay.”

“Sorry I had sex with you, it’s not like it was your idea or anything.” He called over his shoulder, pedalling down the street.

“Whose idea was it?” Cas asked stupidly.

***  
“Alright class, if you’ll please turn to page forty-three, we’ll continue from yesterday.” Dean groaned as the class slapped their textbooks opened, and Mr. Agnew droned on about mols. 

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as Cas took notes, his hand moving fluidly as he wrote in perfect cursive. 

“Hey.” he whispered, as if he has a big, important, secret.

Cas held up a finger- _hold on_. His notes were always so perfect, usually better than the teacher’s actual lesson. It’s probably because he writes little questions for himself and then looks up the answer later, so he ends up knowing way more than anyone else on the subject. Nerd.

At last he set down his pen and turn to look at his friend, raising his eyebrows. “Today’s your uh, doctor’s appointment, isn’t it?” he whispered. He wasn’t sure why they were whispering, the rest of the class was speaking at a normal level, casually ignoring Mr. Agnew’s lesson. 

Dean felt a wave of nausea crash over him. “Yeah.” he whispered back. How was it that Cas always knew what he really wanted to say, even if he never actually said it? 

He felt a hand squeeze his knee, and he felt a little bit better. The hand stayed on his knee, and Cas’s eyes scanned his face, searching. 

“How are you feeling?” he asked, like he actually cared what happened to him. 

Dean forced a shrug, and he shifted his legs so that Cas had to let go. “I just want to get it done, y’know? Kinda like a bandaid, I just wanna rip it off, get it over with.”

Cas looked like he didn’t quite believe him, but he didn’t push it. “Do you… are you sure you don’t want me to go with you? I don’t have to be there for the… procedure, if you don’t want me to, but I can just be there in the lobby or something.”

Dean wasn’t sure what he did to deserve someone being that nice to him. 

He shook his head. “Naw, man. You probably have track practice, right?”

“Technically it’s cross country season,” he corrected.

Dean rolled his eyes. “My _point,_ is that you’re busy. You need to go to practice.”

“You’re more important,” Cas said earnestly. 

Dean felt sick. Cas had no right to say those kind of things so bluntly. 

First of all, track was literally Cas’s entire life. Castiel was the guy that woke up early every morning to go jogging, took PE classes for _fun_ , then went to track practice, and then ran a few miles when he got home, just to blow off some steam. So it’s kind of a big fucking deal if Dean was suddenly more important than track. 

Second of all, Dean _never_ came first. That’s just not who he was. Dean was in charge of putting other people first, not the other way around. When Dean was moving from motel to motel, he was the one who had to put everyone first. He had to put John’s needs first, and more importantly, he had to put Sammy’s needs first. True, he was no longer in charge of Sam the way he was before, Bobby had made sure of that when they went to go live with him, but the deeply ingrained belief remained the same: Dean came last. 

_Unless you’re in chair with Castiel_ , his brain helpfully supplied. A flash of Cas’s face as he pumped Dean’s dick, biting his lip in concentration, made a special appearance in his mind. He used to fantasize about his best friend all the time, but now that he’d actually done it with Cas, his brain seemed to think it was necessary to remind him of it constantly. 

“Are you okay?” Cas asked, his dark eyebrows wrinkled in concern. 

“‘M fine.” Dean lied. “Just uh, just kinda nervous. I fuckin’ hate doctors.”

Cas hummed. “Well, I won’t go if you don’t want me there, but I’ll be there for you if you need it.”

Dean snorted, and shoved his friend playfully. “Dude, don’t be so gay.”

***  
“All babies want to get born! All babies want to get born!” she chanted, waving her sign, **NO BABIES LIKE MURDERING** around. She was the only protester in the mostly-deserted parking lot in front of the abortion clinic, but damn it if she wasn’t making up for it.

Oh shit, Dean knew exactly who she was. 

He plastered on a good-natured grin, and waved. “Oh, hey Becky!” Ugh, Becky was the worst. She not only stalked Dean’s brother Sam last year, but she also spent 99% of her time preaching her shitty opinions to people. Ugh.

Her eyes popped open obscenely wide, and her jaw dropped. “Dean...Winchester! What are you doing here?”

Jesus, what the hell did she think he was doing there?  
He shrugged. “Oh y’know… Hey, have you written that paper for Worth’s class yet?” 

She shook her head. “Nope. I tried to write some of it last night, but I’m having trouble concentrating.” 

“Oh hey, I could sell you some of my Adderall if you want.” Dean suggested, wishing he could get the hell out of there. Why the hell did he even bring that up? He hasn’t even taken any Adderall for the last two years, because Cas didn’t like him taking it, and all it did was make him study harder. 

Becky shook her head. “No thanks, I’m off pills.”

“Yeah, that’s probably a good thing. ‘Cuz I knew this guy who went like super crazy with some behavioral meds, and he ripped off all his clothes, and crashed his car into the side of a Dairy Queen.”

Becky stared at him. “I heard that was you, and that it was marijuana.” 

“Well, it was good seeing you, Becky.” It wasn’t even marijuana, it was Jack Daniels. And he didn’t crash his car, he crashed his bike. He was just trying to make the story sound more interesting, that’s all. 

He sauntered towards the clinic, but Becky called out to him: “Dean!”

He stopped walking, but didn’t turn around. He sighed. “Yes, Becky?”

“Your baby probably has a beating heart you know!”

Yes, yes he knew that. 

“It can _feel pain_. And it has fingernails!”

Huh. Fingernails, really?

***

The man sitting at the front desk refused to look up from his Nintendo DS as he spout out his casual instructions. 

Dean could barely hear him, over the sound of his rapidly beating heart, but he accepted the clipboard nonetheless. 

“Please fill this out, and don’t skip out on the hairy details, we need to know about every sore and every score.” The man’s cocky attitude was emphasized by a shitty British accent and a leery smile, and Dean wanted to throw up.

He sat down on the hard bench, and started to fill out the paperwork.

Name: Dean Michael Winchester. Easy.

The woman next to him scratched her arm loudly. Dean glanced over at her, but she was too invested in her own paperwork to notice. He started to write his date of birth, when the man sitting across from him started chewing on his nails.

Ugh, his _fingernails._

Babies can’t really have those, right? Not ones that haven’t been born yet, right? Like, tiny fetuses? Dean was only a month pregnant, so it wasn’t possible. Oh fuck, what did he know about babies? 

Absolutely nothing, that’s why he had to do this. 

_Scratch scratch scratch._

A woman standing by the front desk filed her nails calmly, dragging her fingernails across the surface of the file in a deafening sound. What the fuck was up with everybody messing with their nails? A little kid sitting by himself picked at a hangnail.

_Fingernails fingernails fingernails fingernails._

It was all Dean could hear, all he could think about. No he couldn’t remember how long he had been ugh, _sexually active_ for, because the guy sitting at the front desk kept dragging his nails through his scalp.

Before he knew it, he was running out the doors of the clinic, with his phone pressed to his ear. 

“Dean? I thought you were at the clinic?” Cas’s voice said through the phone.

Shit. Since when did he call Cas with all of his issues?

“Cas? Aren’t you supposed to be at track practice?”

“Crosscountry. And no, I decided to skip.” He said calmly. “Are you okay? Where are you?”

“Why’d you skip?”

“ _Dean._ ” Cas said in his Dean-Winchester-I-am-not-even-remotely-in-the-area-of-fucking-around voice.

“Outside the clinic.” Dean mumbled, defeated. “I couldn’t do it, man. I just couldn’t do it.”

He heard Cas exhale in relief. “Do you need me to come pick you up?”

He shook his head no, but then remembered that Cas couldn’t see him. And that Jo was coming to pick him up in a few hours, and for some reason, he didn’t want to see anyone but Cas.

“...yeah.”

***  
Cas was silent the entire car-ride home, only humming and nodding at the appropriate places.

“And the guy at the clinic was babbling away in a freakin’ British accent, which by the way, was totally fake, just like the name on his nametag. Who the fuck names their kid Balthazar? No offense, Cas.” 

Cas chuckled. “None taken.”

“And oh! Fuckin’ Becky was there. Becky Rosen, the one who hands out pamphlets at school about how omegas shouldn’t even go to school and how they should just be assigned to alphas, who fucking thinks that?”

“That’s ridiculous.” Cas murmured.

“Yeah! Anyway, she was there, and she was like ‘oh hey Dean, did you know that babies have fingernails?’ _Fingernails,_ Cas!”

“Gruesome.”

“Yeah.” He closed his eyes, and breathed out. “I’m gonna have to do this, Cas.”

“I know.”

“Are you mad?”

Cas turned into the driveway of Dean’s house, and turned the car off. “Why would I be angry with you, Dean?”

Dean squirmed uncomfortably. “I dunno. ‘Cuz I was gonna get rid of our baby. ‘Cuz now I’m gonna have it and everyone’s gonna say shit about us. ‘Cuz I got myself pregnant. “Just ‘cuz.”  
Cas looked angry then, but not at Dean. 

“Dean, look at me.” He commanded, and Dean looked. “First of all, that’s ridiculous. You didn’t get yourself pregnant, it takes two to conceive, so it’s just as much my fault. Second of all, I told you that whatever you felt was best to take care of you, then you have to do it. If that means terminating the pregnancy, then that is what you should do. If that means having the baby, then you should do that. Either way, I’ll be there for you.”

Dean squeezed his hand, and smiled weakly. “Good thing we’re such good friends, huh? I’m lucky to have you.”

Cas patted Dean’s knee. “Of course.”

“Someday, you’re gonna mate with someone who’ll treat you the way that you treat me.”

Cas looked pained by what Dean said, but he rolled his eyes just the same. “Everyone deserves respect, Dean. That’s all I’m giving you.”

Maybe Dean was overly emotional due to the hormones, or the almost-abortion, or whatever, but he teared up a little bit. Sonouva bitch.

***  
“Dean.”

“Mmpph.”

“Dean, wake the fuck up. Dean!” Jo screeched, and Dean jolted awake. He blinked around. What the fuck? 

Oh yeah. After Cas walked him up to his room, he basically passed out on his bed.

Joanna Beth Harvelle was standing over him, looking royally pissed.

“Dean, where the hell were you? I went to go pick you up at the clinic, and you weren’t there. The dude at the front desk said you bolted. Are you okay?”

Dean sat up, and scrubbed a hand across his face. “I… yeah. ‘M fine. I couldn’t do it, Jo.”

Jo’s face softened, and she sat down next to her friend. “What happened?”

Dean sighed. “I don’t want to talk about it. I already ranted to Cas about how much it sucked.”

“Cas? You talked to Cas?” She looked surprised. 

“Yeah. He came and picked me up.”

“Why wasn’t he at track?”

“Cross-country.” Dean muttered. 

“What?”

“Nothing.” Dean laid back down on the bed, and stretched his legs out. Jo followed, tucking her head into his chest.

“So, he skipped _cross-country_ to go get you, even though you already had a ride waiting?” She asked, picking a stray hair off of her jeans. 

Dean shrugged. “He was skipping anyway. I kinda think he was waiting around for me to get done when I called him.”

Jo was staring at Dean, smiling slightly. “He loves you.”

Dean sputtered, but recovered quickly. “Y-you know, it’s a very delicate topic, and I don’t feel comfortable talking about it in my fragile state.”

Jo snorted. “Whatever preggo. ‘No chick-flick moments’, I know.” She sat up. “But dude, what are you gonna do about this?” She asked, gesturing to his stomach.

“I’m staying pregnant, Jo.”

She sighed. “Dean.”

“No, it’s cool. I was thinkin’, maybe I could like, give the baby to someone who needs it. Like two omegas that mated, or a lonely beta or something. Adopt it out.”

“Yeah, but you’ll get huge, dude. And you’ll have to you know, _tell people_.”

The door to Dean’s bedroom slammed open, and a twelve-year old twerp bounced in. “Tell people what, Dean?”

“Sammy, get out, the grownups are talking.”

Sam laughed. “You are not a grownup, you’re sixteen! Just tell me.” He flopped himself down into the beanbag chair and looked up expectantly. “I won’t tell Uncle Bobby.”

Dean and Jo exchanged glances, and Jo shrugged.

“Sam, this is some serious shit. ‘nd I’m gonna tell Uncle Bobby, but you gotta let me do it, okay?”

Sam nodded seriously. It wasn’t very often his brother actually told him cool teenager stuff.  
“I’m uh, I’m pregnant.”

Sam’s face lit up, and he squealed in delight. “No way! Like for real?” He leapt of the beanbag chair and rushed to Dean’s stomach. “Is it a boy or a girl? Is it gonna call me Uncle Sam? This is so great!”

Dean pushed his kid brother away. “Knock it off Sammy. I’m not keeping it.”

Sam looked as if Dean had just hit him. “You mean you’re gonna…? Y’know?”

“...no. That ain’t for me. I’m gonna find someone that needs a kid, and I’m gonna give it to them.”

Sam thought about it for a moment, and then pulled Dean into a hug. “Dean, that’s actually so amazing, you’re gonna make somebody who’s really sad because they can’t have kids really happy!”

“Yeah, yeah, kid. I’m a freakin’ martyr.”

Dean felt a knot untwist in his stomach. One person down. 

***

After Jo went home, and Sam got tired of suggesting names for the baby (“I’m not naming it dude, that’s what the adoptive parents do”), Dean found himself stretched out on his bed, browsing adoption sites online. It made him slightly nervous to be laying on his stomach like he usually did, so he sat upright.

Metallica rang through the air, and Dean felt around for his cell phone. “Hello?”

“Dean.”

A warm feeling made his way through his chest. “Oh, hey man! How’s it going?”

“I’m just doing some homework. I called to see how you’re doing.” He was so _genuine,_ it made Dean want to puke, sometimes. 

Actually no, he really did need to puke. He bolted upright, and dove towards the small trashcan that was across the room. After hacking up half his organs and a pizza, he wiped his mouth and found his way back to his phone, that was still sitting on his bed.

“Dean? Hello? Are you okay?” Dean could tell he was trying hard to keep his cool. 

“‘M good. Just hanging out. Well, puking a second ago, but before that I was hanging. Jo was here earlier.”

“Oh.” Good ol’ Cas, casually ignoring the fact that Dean was just barfing. “Do you want to talk about it?” 

Dean knew that he wasn’t talking about the puke. Cas always knew what Dean really meant to say, even if he didn’t come right out and say it. 

“I’m going to give it up for adoption. I’m staying pregnant, dude.”

Cas was quiet.

“Cas?”

“Yes, Dean?”

Dean felt fidgety. “Are you… you’re not mad at me, right? I just don’t think I could handle raising a kid, y’know?”

“No, I didn’t say you were.” Cas said, void of emotion. 

“You wanna raise it? Is that it?”

“I’m not ready to parent, either.”

“Then what’s the fuckin’ problem? It’s like you have no opinion on this. Do you even care?” Dean felt irrationally angry. Why would it matter if Cas cared or not? It wouldn’t affect his decision. 

“Of course I care!” Cas snapped. “I’m just concerned about you. You’re being very casual about such a huge decision, and I’m worried about how you really feel. That’s a thing that friends do.”

Dean felt stung by his words. “I… I’m scared Cas. I’m scared shitless. This is terrifying, but I can’t go through with the alternative. I just can’t.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I… I’m looking at adoption websites online.”

“Do you want me to look with you?”

This is how they ended up shopping for adoptive parents online together, over the phone. 

“What about this couple? ‘Wholesome, spiritually wealthy couple have found true love with each other.’ They seem nice.”

“Fuck no, Cas. They seem lame.”

“The people who adopt our child has to be cool?” Dean could just picture him wrinkling his nose. Cas wasn’t exactly the epitome of cool, and Dean sometimes wondered if that was on purpose. Nobody else could wear those yellow running shorts and tube socks and not be doing it ironically, right?

“I don’t know, I guess so. I want it to grow up to be a badass, like me.”

“Well what did you have in mind?”

“I dunno. I was thinking like, graphic designer, who lives in like a cool studio-apartment, plays electric guitar in a band, and has like a hot Asian girlfriend.” Dean said. “But I don’t want to be too particular.”

“Dean, that _was_ particular.” Cas pointed out.

“Okay, yeah, but you get what I mean, right? I don’t want the kid going to some giant, super religious family full of wackos.”

“Yes, because that would be a tragedy.” 

Oh shit. Dean completely forgot that Cas grew up with six siblings, under a household where praying before every meal was as necessary as the food itself. 

“Oh but… uh, shit. But you turned out okay. That’s not what I meant.”

“Dean, it’s okay. I was already aware that you don’t take my religion seriously. It’s fine.”

“Cas…” Dean sighed. It was something that Cas cared a lot about, and most of the time, Dean pretended that his best friend slept in on Sundays like everyone else. 

There was that one time, however, freshman year. John had left Dean and Sam at Bobby’s the year before, and had finally called for the first time. And because the universe hates his fucking guts, Cas happened to be hanging out at his house that day. 

Dean hung up with father, after getting the phone back from Sam, and he smashed it. Cas watched as Dean completely broke down, throwing shit left and right. Why didn’t his dad want them? _Take care of Sam, son. That’s your job._ No clue as to when he’d come back for them, no questions about how his life had been, no “I love you”s. 

Afterwords, Cas pulled a sobbing Dean into his arms, and rocked back and forth. Later, Dean would realize that Cas had been murmuring a prayer to God, but at the moment, Dean pretended that Cas was whispering words of love in his ear. 

He probably should have realized how screwed he was at that point. 

“Hey, what about this couple? Go to page two, and scroll down to the bottom.” Cas suggested, and Dean followed the instructions. The moment he saw the picture, he knew. 

 

“Educated, successful couple wishes to adopt a child…” was the headline, accompanied by a picture of a stunning brunette woman, her arm slung around a redheaded woman, who was laughing, but equally as beautiful. 

They were Lisa and Charlie Braeden, and they were beautiful, even in their tiny, two inch picture. 

“They’re perfect.”

***

“Bobby, I gotta tell you something, but I have got no idea how to spit this out.” Dean announced, coming down the stairs, Jo and Sam trailing behind.

Bobby leaned back in his chair. “Spit what out?”

Dean paced back and forth. “I did something.”

“But it wasn’t his fault!” Sam piped up. 

“Let me handle this, you little bitch.” Dean muttered, shoving Sam away.

“Jerk!” He shot back, sticking his tongue out. Honestly, the kid was way too old to be doing this shit.

“Did you get expelled, boy?” Bobby asked, fixing Dean a glare. “‘Cuz if you did, I swear-”

“No! Nothing like that. And anyway, the school would likely contact you in the event of my expulsion.” Dean interrupted. 

Bobby raised his eyebrows. “Well? You didn’t crash the Impala, did you? Your old man would kill you.”

“No, no. Nothing like that.”

From behind him, Jo grabbed his hand and squeezed it. “I think you just need to just rip the band-aid off, dude.”

Dean swallowed, and Bobby readjusted himself in his seat.

“I’m pregnant.”

Bobby was speechless. “Boy…” he sighed.

“I’m going to give it up for adoption, though! I already found a family, and I talked to them on the phone. I’m gonna meet them next week. They said they’re gonna pay for everything, all my medical bills and stuff, so really all you’ll have to do is drive me to the hospital, because I don’t think you’re supposed to drive while in labor…” Dean babbled, pacing the room again.

Bobby was up and out of his chair before Dean knew it, and pulling him into a hug. “Dammit, kid. How’d this happen?”

Dean slumped into his surrogate father’s arms. “‘Cuz I’m an idiot.” He mumbled. 

Bobby hugged him tighter. “No, you’re not. You’re an idgit, sure. But not an idiot.”  
Dean thought about telling Bobby that technically that was the same thing, but he knew what he meant, so he just dropped it.

Bobby released Dean, and sat back down in his chair. “I’m coming with you to meet this family. You’re just a kid, I don’t want you to get ripped off by a couple of wack jobs. Who’s the father?”

“Well, actually it’s two women that are adopting it so technically there is no father...” 

Bobby sighed. “No, Dean. The _father._ ” He looked pointedly at Dean’s stomach.

“Oh! It’s uh… Castiel Novak.”

Bobby snorted.

“What?”

“Don’t know why I bothered to ask.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dean protested.

Jo laughed, slinging her arm over his shoulders. “Winchester, you’ve got it bad.”

***  
“Holy shit, Bobby, they’re fucking rich.” Dean gasped as they pulled into Charlie and Lisa’s neighborhood. Every house they drove past had at least three garages, three stories, and massive yards. This was a whole different world from Bobby’s one-storied house.

They finally pulled into the Braedan’s driveway, after driving past just about a million mini-mansions that all seemed to look identical yet not, and rang their doorbell. 

The brunette from the picture opened the door, and grinned at them, flashing her blindingly white teeth at them.

“Hi! I’m Lisa. You must be Dean, hi.”

“Hello, m’am. Bobby Singer.” Bobby said, sticking his hand out. “Thank you for inviting me and my irresponsible kid into your home.”

Lisa laughed. “No, thank you. You have no idea how excited we are that you called us. Come in, please.”

Dean and Bobby entered their living room, and before Dean could plop himself on their expensive looking couch, he was attacked.

Well, it was a hug, but it sort of came out of nowhere, so Dean was comfortable with calling it an attack.

“Dean, we are so happy you called us!” The red headed woman exclaimed. “Lisa and I have wanted a child for so long!”

Lisa laughed nervously as she entered the living room, a serious looking man in a suit following behind her. “Charlie, babe.” She chastised. “Please don’t scare the pregnant man.”

“Sorry, man. I’m just excited.” Charlie apologized, shaking his hand, which seemed a little redundant after the surprise hug. “I’m Charlie.”

“Dean.” He said, taking her hand anyway. That’s when he noticed that she was wearing a Star Trek t-shirt. “Hey! Nice shirt!”

Charlie beamed. “Have you seen the new movie yet? I keep telling Lis’ that I don’t have the hots for Uhura, but I definitely do.” She said, whispering the last part conspirially and Lisa rolled her eyes.

“Okay ladies and gents, lets get this taken care of, shall we?” The man in the suit said, herding people to their seats.

“Dean, this is our lawyer, Crowley.” 

“Crow-leee…” Dean said, enunciating each and every letter. “That’s funny, the guy at the abortion clinic had a British accent too. Apparently all of you work with pregnant dudes.” Dean noted, and then after noticing how everyone in the room was wincing, regretted it. He had a habit of putting his foot in his mouth when he was nervous.

“I uh, didn’t get the abortion. Obviously.” Dean added, blushing. Lisa smiled awkwardly.

“Well, that’s good.” She said. She stood up, suddenly. “I’m sorry, did you want something to drink? Dean? Mr. Singer? We have water, and soda, and juice, and I think there’s some tea in there too..”

Bobby shook his head no at the same time that Dean said, “Water please.” Lisa scurried away to get their drinks, and was back quick enough to make Dean suspect that she had laid out a bunch of drinks in their kitchen. 

“Thanks, Lisa.” Dean said, and she grinned at him emphatically. 

Crowley coughed awkwardly. “Anyways, let’s get started.” He pulled out some papers out of his briefcase. “How far along are you?”

“I’m a junior.” 

Charlie laughed. “No, he means how far along in the pregnancy.”

Dean felt himself blush. “I, oh. Twelve weeks.” 

“Oh, that’s great! That means you’re almost into your second trimester, right?” Lisa asked.

“Uh, I guess so. My friend Jo, her mom Ellen already took me to the doctor’s and they said I’m due on May 4th. 

“So, the worst part is basically over for you, right? My friends say that the first trimester is the worst.” Lisa said. 

Dean shrugged awkwardly. These people were so nice, he wasn’t used to it. “Yeah. I ‘spose so. I didn’t really notice it. Well, I did, because I kept puking all the time, but I thought I was just sick or whatever. Probably because I was in pretty big denial about being pregnant for a while, you know?”

“I wouldn’t know.” Lisa said, and Charlie reached for her hand and squeezed it. They smiled at each other, and Dean felt like they were having a private discussion with their eyes. 

“Mrs. and Mrs. Braeden are willing to negotiate an open adoption,” Crowley said, smoothly changing the subject.

“What the hell does that mean?” Bobby asked, speaking for the first time since they arrived. 

“It just means that we’d send you annual photos of the baby, let you know how it’s growing up, things like that. You wouldn’t have any sort of legal rights or anything…” Charlie said.

“Whoa, whoa. I don’t need any pictures or anything. Can’t I just like, have the thing and give it to you? Stick in a basket and leave it on your front porch, Harry Potter style?”

Charlie laughed. “Right, because that worked out so well for him.”

Dean liked her. “Yeah, well, I figure you guys aren’t as bad as the Dursleys or whatever, and I’m pretty sure it won’t come out a wizard.”

“Damn.” She said. Oh yeah, Dean liked her. He was definitely cool with his kid growing up with Charlie as a mom. 

“And, you don’t already have some bratty other kid that’ll bully it, so that’s a plus!” 

Lisa and Charlie exchanged looks. “Yeah, well we definitely don’t have any other kid.” Charlie said at last. “That parts for sure.” 

Dean realized that was probably a touchy subject.

“Right… so we all agree that a traditional closed adoption will be what we do.” Crowley said, and Dean decided that he definitely did not like him. 

“That sounds like it’s for the best.” Bobby agreed.

“Mrs. and Mrs. Braeden have also agreed to compensate you for any medical expenses.” Crowley added.

“Are you looking for any other sort of compensation?” Lisa asked. 

“What?” Bobby asked.

“What the fuck? I’m not going to _sell_ the thing to you!” Dean bursted. The adults all turned to stare at him, and Dean realized he was putting his foot in his mouth again. “Er, uh. I just meant that I’m not doing this make money… I just want it to grow up with people who will love it and take care of it.”

Lisa beamed. “I want to be a mom so badly.” She said, leaning into Charlie’s space.

Charlie kissed the top of her head. “We both do.”

***  
Dean was sitting on the floor of his bedroom, leaning against his bed. He was going through some book about omega pregnancy that Lisa and Charlie had given him, while Cas listened to him talk.

“They’re honestly the best, Cas. They really just want to start their family and stuff.” 

“That’s really great, Dean, it sounds like you’re doing a good thing for them.” Cas replied. 

Dean had tried to call him as soon as he got home, but his nerves got the best of him. It didn’t matter, though, because Cas ended up calling him, first.

“Do you- do you think that maybe you should meet them too? I wanna make sure that you like ‘em.”

“I don’t need to meet them, Dean.” 

“Oh.” Dean flipped to a picture of two men holding a baby, looking down at it lovingly. He quickly moved on to the next page, not wanting to think too hard about families. 

“It’s not that I don’t want to, I’m just saying that I don’t need to in order for you to chose them as the couple that adopts the baby. That’s your decision. 

“Right.”

They were quiet for a few moments, Dean flipping through the book, and Cas doing his homework. He pressed the speaker phone button, and set in on his bed. He closed his eyes and listened to the soothing scritch-scratch of Cas’s frantic pencil. 

“I haven’t told my dad yet.” Dean confessed. 

The pencil scratching stopped. “Are you going to?” Cas asked. 

Cas understood Dean’s complicated relationship with John, and it was nice not having to explain himself to him. 

John and Dean had never been close, but it didn’t stop Dean from trying desperately during the first twelve years of his life to change that. After his mom had died in a car crash on the way home from work, John was never the same. He sold their house in Lawrence, and set off with four-year old Dean and baby Sam, working odd jobs from town to town. Bobby, who had been John’s childhood friend, eventually put his foot down while they were sweeping Sioux Falls, and John left. 

Now John called every couple of months to check in on them. He’s been working through Arizona these last couple of years, and sends Dean and Sam a cactus every holiday. Which is nice, but it’s like, thanks a heap Coyote Ugly, this cactusgram stings worse than your abandonment. 

Dean sighed. “I kind of have to, right? What if he shows up at the house and I’m walkin’ around like I’m Kim Kardashian?”

“Who’s that?” Cas asked, politely ignoring the fact that John hadn’t visited them in over a year, and it wasn’t likely that they would hear from him soon. 

“She’s… nevermind. Point is, I gotta tell him, dude. He’s my dad, he’s gotta know this shit.” 

“Are you going to call him?”

Dean slammed the pregnancy book closed. “Probably. Maybe next week. I’m s’posed to start showing soon.”

Cas didn’t say anything, but Dean imagined that he probably wanted to get back to his homework. “Anyways, thanks for calling me, dude.”

“Of course, Dean. I just wanted to make sure that you’re okay.”

Dean felt his heart constrict, and he blew out a breath, trying not to let his voice get shaky. “You just uh, you’re pretty good at taking care of me, y’know? No one else has ever done that before.”

“Bobby takes care of you.” Cas pointed out.

“Yeah but uh, not like you do, Cas.”

They ended up talking for a while after that, because that’s what they always end up doing when they start to hang up. Dean fell asleep with a huge grin on his face, and he knew that he was royally fucked.


	2. Winter

_“Dad, what’s an omega?” Dean asked, slamming the door of the hotel room._

_A bleary-eyed John glanced up at Dean, took a swig from his bottle, and sighed. “Where’d you hear that, son?”_

_“In school today. Mark told me Alice has two dads because one of them is an omega, and he said he hopes that he’s not gonna be an omega because they’re dumb. What does that mean?” The young Winchester curled up next to his drunk father, oblivious to his condition._

_From the other room, he heard a wailing sound. Before his father could say a word, Dean was up and across the room, to take care of Sammy._

_Once the two year old was fed and happily playing with some toys, Dean wandered back to his father, asking the same questions._

_“Dean, I’m gonna give you The Talk now, because you’re old enough.” John declared, setting down the bottle._

_Dean preened, he loved it when his dad said things like that. Dean was a big boy, and he could totally handle whatever John had to say._

_“Right, so there’s moms and dads,” he began, and Dean nodded eagerly. “Then sometimes there’s moms and moms, and dads and dads.”_

_“I know all that, Dad!” Dean giggled. Everyone knew that kind of stuff, Dean wasn’t dumb._

_“When it’s a mom and dad, the mom gives birth. But what happens when it’s two moms or two dads?”_

_Dean scratched his head. What did happen? Oh wait, he’s seen this before on TV! “Then one of the daddies or one of the mommies has the baby. But how do they decided that?”_

_“They don’t decide, Dean. When it’s two moms or dads, they’re usually an alpha and omega. Now, when that happens, the omegas have the baby. When it’s two men, the omega is the only one who can have the baby.”_

_“Oh!” Dean said. “I’ve seen daddies that are pregnant before.”_

_“Right. So that’s what an omega is. Usually when a couple is mated, the alpha takes care of the omega, that’s their job.”_

_“Like how I take care of Sammy!” Dean said, pleased that he understood._

_John chuckled. “Not exactly, but yeah. You won’t be an omega son, don’t worry.”_

_“What’s wrong with being an omega? I like babies.” Dean didn’t understand. He liked taking care of Sammy. He could probably take care of other babies when he grew up._

_John sighed. “First of all son, most Winchester men are alphas. That’s just how it is. Second of all, omegas are always really weak, prissy men. Are you weak, Dean?”_

_Dean jutted out his chin, and tried to look as tough as possible. “No way, dad!”_

_John patted Dean on the head affectionately. “Well then there you go. You won’t find out until puberty if you’re an alpha or not, but trust me son, you won’t be. You could be a beta, but either way, you won’t be an omega. No Winchester has been an omega in generations. I’m an alpha, your grandfather was a beta, and his father was an alpha. You’ll be fine, Dean.”_

_“I’m gonna be an alpha just like you, Dad!” Dean declared proudly._

_Dean had heard about things like equal rights and omegaphobia, but they were just words to him, and John’s opinions were everything._

***

Bobby handed him the last of the dishes to dry, and turned off the sink. They had done the dishes together in a comfortable silence, but now it was obvious that the older man had something to say. 

He sighed, and gripped the sink. “Dammit, boy. I hate to ask.”

Dean’s throat tightened, and a wave of panic rushed over him. He hated when Bobby said something like this, it usually meant he was about to get lectured, and nine times out of ten Bobby was usually right. 

“What is it, Bobby?”

Bobby closed his eyes, and exhaled before turning to Dean. “You haven’t called and talked to your daddy about this yet, have you?”

“About what?” Dean asked, although it was pretty damn obvious. Bobby glanced pointedly at Dean’s stomach, which was starting to poke out a bit.

“No way.” He turned and started marching towards the living room.  
Bobby followed him, arguing. “And why the hell not? He’s your father, he should know!”

Dean whipped around and raised an eyebrow at Bobby. “So? I haven’t even seen him in years. Why do I care? Why would _he_ care?” Jesus, this had to be because of hormones, right? In all the years that Dean had been living with Bobby, neither of them had ever once brought up the John topic. 

“He cares.” Bobby said, softly. “And you gotta talk to him, boy. Be the bigger person.”

Dean scoffed. “Isn’t that his job? He’s the parent, not me.”

“You’ve been doing most of his jobs your whole life, anyway.” Bobby said evenly, and Dean knew that he was right.

Dean plopped himself down on the old sofa, and sighed. “Bobby… I’ve never even told him that I’m an omega.”

Bobby raised his eyebrows, but said nothing. 

“Like, I know there’s nothing wrong with it. Health class told me that it’s biology that makes us who we are, and yadda yadda yadda, but try to convince _him_ that.”

Bobby sat down next to the teenager, and patted his shoulder awkwardly.

“Dean, your dad has some prejudices.” Bobby admitted.

“No shit, Bobby.”

“But, you just gotta remember that you’re doing the right thing, here, and hope that John understands that.”

“What if he doesn’t?” 

“Then you got me, boy.”

***  
Alone in his room again, Dean fumbled with his cell phone, his palms getting sweaty. He could do this. He just had to call his dad who he hadn’t even spoken to in months, and tell him that he was not only an omega, but he was pregnant. Great.

Instead of dialing John’s number, he found himself calling Cas.

“Dean.”  
“Cas. I-shit. Sorry. I didn’t mean to call you.”

“Oh. Well. That’s alright. I’ll see you on Monday at school.” It sounded like he was about to hang up, and Dean panicked. 

“I’m telling my dad.” He cut in.

“Right now?” Cas asked, confused.

“Yeah.” He mumbled. “I got nervous and called you instead. My bad.”

“That’s okay.” Castiel said gently. 

“Could you… could I call you again when I’m done telling him?” Dean asked.

“Sure, Dean.” 

Dean hung up with his friend, and punched his dad’s number into the phone before he could stop himself. 

“Hello?” A gruff voice asked, clearly already impatient. Holy shit, he answered. Months of radio silence, and the guy just picks up his phone on the first ring. 

Dean choked. He tried to force words out his mouth, but nothing was there. As soon as he tells his dad, everything will change. It was like before he took the pregnancy test, and was in serious denial about being pregnant. If he does it, it’ll make it more real. 

“...Dean? That you?”

Dean exhaled. Of course his dad has his number. He’s going to look at the caller ID. Duh.

“H-hi Dad.” Dean said finally.

“What’s wrong, son? Why’d you call me?”

“Uh…” Dean gripped the phone tightly. He could do this. 

“Is Sammy in trouble? Bobby? Speak up!”

“It’s me!” He blurted out. Jesus, why was he sweating so much?

“What’s you? What?”

“I...I’m the one that’s in trouble. Er- I’m not in trouble. ‘Cuz I got a solution. You don’t have to do anything or come back here to help or anything I just thought, well, Bobby just thought, that you should probably know…” Dean was babbling, and he knew it just made him sound like an idiot, but he couldn’t stop.

“Spit it out, Dean. What happened?” Dean could see a million scenarios running through John’s mind. Crashing the truck? Failed out of school? Got someone pregnant. Hah. 

_“I’m_ pregnant.” He whispered.

He could hear John breathing on the other side of the phone. Silent. What was he thinking? Out of all the people he’d told so far- Cas, Bobby, Jo, Sam… none of them reacted with silence. Dean wished badly that he could see his face. 

“Did you schedule your abortion yet?” He asked.

Dean winced at the word abortion, and protectively placed a hand over his stomach. Well, that wasn’t exactly the reaction he had expected, but if you asked him if he was surprised, he’d be lying if he said yes.

“I’m not uh, I’m not doing that. Sir.”

“You’re gonna keep it?” He scoffed.

“No. I found this family that’s going to adopt it.”

“Good. You’re damn well not ready to be a parent.” 

Dean felt a twinge of resentment at that. Who was he to say that Dean would be a bad parent? Hell, he raised Sam more than John ever did. But he stuffed his anger down, and agreed.

“No. No, you’re right.”

“Jesus, Dean. I didn’t even know you _could_ get pregnant.” John sounded like the worst combination of disappointed and disgusted.

“That’s uh, that’s me. Dean Winchester: Omega Extraordinaire.” Fuck, why did he even say that? Obviously he’s an omega. 

“I always assumed you were an alpha, Dean. Every time I call Bobby he says that you’re fighting girls off you everyday.”

What the hell? Just because he was an omega doesn’t mean that he’s not a stone cold stud! He did have girls fighting for him, if he recalled. He spent weeks trying to convince both Bela and Meg that he wasn’t interested. He didn’t like to examine why exactly he wasn’t interested in the two beautiful girls, but Jo made enough jokes that basically everyone else knew why.

“Er, that part was true. I still like girls.” Dean admitted. And it’s true, he did like girls. A lot, actually. It’s just that he liked someone else a lot more. 

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

Dean knew what John was saying. John was saying everything he always said about omegas being weak and worthless. 

“Dean, I’m not angry with you.” John said, after Dean was silent for a few moments.

“Okay, well. Bobby said I should tell you… so. I’m telling you.”

“Thanks for calling, son.” John said, with a hint of warmth in his voice. 

“Okay. Bye, Dad.” Dean said, hanging up before John had a chance to say more. Sighing, he tossed his phone on the floor, and curled in on himself.

That didn’t go quite as he expected, then again, it didn’t quite go unexpected. He could hear the door creak open downstairs, and he closed his eyes. It was probably one of Sam’s friends coming over to play or something. 

“Deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeean!” A voice from downstairs called, and he heard the sound of a twelve year old pounding up the stairs. 

“Go away, Sammy.”

“Castiel is heeeeere!” Sam announced, flinging the door open.

Dean remained unmoved. “Tell him to go home.”

“Dean said to go home.” Sam said, and Dean heard the sound of Cas chuckling. 

“Yeah, I heard that. Thank you, Sam.”

“Go away, Sammy.” Dean repeated.

He heard Cas shuffle into the room, accompanied by the sound of swishy plastic. He sat up and opened his eyes, to find Cas standing in the middle of his bedroom, proudly holding an enormous black garbage bag.  
Sam was peeking around the door at them, and Dean asked him to leave again.

“That’s not fair, you said Cas had to leave too.”

“Well, I changed my mind. Out.”

Sam scampered away, muttering about ‘boyfriends’ and ‘getting pregnant twice’, and Dean promised himself he’d get back at the little twerp later. 

Dean raised his eyebrows and pointed at the bag. “We takin’ the trash out?”

“Nope.” Cas looked extremely pleased with himself. “I got you a gift!” He fumbled with a case of orange tic tacs, before popping a few in his mouth. Orange tic tacs are Cas’s one and only vice. The day Dean got pregnant, his mouth tasty really tangy and delicious. 

“Christmas isn’t for another three weeks.”

“I felt like you needed it early.” Cas shrugged, and then dragged the plastic trash bag in between Dean’s legs. He sat down on the floor, and looked up at him expectantly. 

Dean tore open the bag, and found a huge pile of t-shirts. “Shirts?” He asked.

“Just look at them.”

Dean picked up the first one. It was solid black, with a drawing of a white angel on it, and said “Led Zeppelin 1977” on the front.

He turned to Cas. “You got me a pile of band tees?”

“Look at the size.”

Dean fumbled with the shirt until he found the little white tag on the inside of the collar. “2XL. So…?”

Cas stared at him patiently while he waited for him to catch up.

Then in clicked. Last week, he had been moaning that he was going to get fat soon, and wouldn’t fit into any of his favorite shirts. What did Cas do? He went out and bought him bigger fucking t-shirts.

Dean clutched Cas’s arm, and dragged him up so that he was sitting next to Dean on the bed.

“You bought me shirts. Shirts I can fit into soon.”

Cas nodded. “You seemed very distressed about having to wear Bobby’s shirts.”

Before Dean could think about it, he was kissing the side of Cas’s lips, soft and slow. When he pulled back, Cas was staring at him, wide-eyed. Dean felt himself blush so hard it went to his ears.

“I uh, sorry. You know how I get with Led Zeppelin.”

Cas smirked. “Right. You kiss people.”

“Only when they buy me Led Zeppelin shirts in extra large sizes because I’m about to get really giant and they don’t want me wearing Bobby’s greasy old shirts.” 

Then Cas leaned into him and kissed him again, open-mouthed and sweet. Dean opened his mouth, and let Cas lick into him. Suddenly Cas was on top of him, and they were making out.

It was warm and slow. And orangy. They weren’t in a rush, like last time, worried that Missouri would come home any minute and they’d be done dog sitting. No, that time had been filled with awkwardness and rushed confessions. Sure, there was still the pitter-patter of a nervous heartbeat between the two, but they were comfortable. Dean’s dick was slowly making it’s appearance, and that was certainly alright with Dean.

Cas broke away and started peppering light, trailing kisses down his neck, right where he _knows_ it makes Dean moan. “Jesus, Cas…”

He felt a _thump-thump_ in his lower abdomen, and it took about twelve seconds for him to realize that it was the baby kicking. 

Cas flew off of him, and instantly had his hands on Dean’s stomach. “Dean… did you feel that?” he asked, mesmerized. 

Dean rolled his eyes. “No, did you?” He asked, sarcastically.

“It kicked.” He murmured. 

“I know. It was my ribs it was kicking.”

“I didn’t even ask, how was calling your father?” Cas asked, finally looking up from Dean’s middle. 

Dean sighed. Thanks for killing the mood, you little parasite. 

“It sucked, dude.”

“Is he angry?”

Dean flopped back down on the bed. Clearly they weren’t going to go back to making out any time soon. Might as well talk about shit he doesn’t want to. 

Cas carefully laid down next to him, dangerously close to cuddling. Dean wrapped an arm around Cas’s shoulder, allowing his head to rest on his chest. 

“I mean, last time I talked to him was on my birthday.”

“Dean, that’s almost a year ago.”

Dean managed a shrug. “Sounds about right. You know he never talks to me.”

“His loss.” Cas declared, burrowing his nose into Dean’s side. “If you were my son, I would talk to you everyday.” 

Dean snorted. “That’s not creepy at all, Cas.” You know, coming from a guy who recently knocked him up and all. 

Cas lifted his head to look at Dean. “I guess it is a little. Apologies, you knew what I meant.”

“Yeah, yeah. Incest jokes aside, thanks.”

***  
Cas loved the feeling of running. Especially during the wintertime, the icy air felt good on his lungs. Practice was over for the most part, he was just getting in few more laps before it started to get dark. 

Samandriel caught up to Castiel, who was currently on his fourth lap around the track. Frost ghosted out of their lips. 

“Hey, did you hear that Dean Winchester is pregnant?”

Cas nodded. He hated talking while he ran. Sure, he was an excellent runner, but not if he had to hold a conversation at the same time. 

“Did you hear it’s yours?” Alphie asked, grinning. 

Cas nodded again. “Yep.”

“What’s he going to do with a baby? I mean, he can barely pass English.”

Cas glared at the freshman. “Dean is perfectly capable of passing English. He is also perfectly capable of raising a child.” Cas wanted to tell him that Dean had already done it once with his brother Sam, but that was the sort of thing that Castiel was learning wasn’t appropriate to just go and tell people. 

Alphie shrugged. “Sorry, it’s just that he’s kind of known for being an idiot, that’s all. I mean, I’m sure he was great in bed, eh Castiel?” The kid attempted to jab him in the ribs, but Cas moved away from him slightly, and Alphie stumbled over him. 

“I don’t think that’s any of your business.” Cas snapped. 

“Sorry! Not trying to get all up in your grill, here. Don’t worry, you can leave things up to the imagination.”

“He’s giving it up for adoption.” 

Alphie raised his eyebrows. “Don’t want any baby mama drama?” 

“It was entirely his choice.” Castiel corrected. “Not mine.” 

“Whatever you say, dude. I’m a beta, but if I ever got someone pregnant, you know they’d be aborting that shit so fast.”

Cas ran a little bit faster, and managed to get away from the freshman.

***

“Aaaand… this is the head.” The doctor said, pointing at the screen. Charlie squealed, and squeezed Dean’s hand tighter. 

Bobby was too busy at the shop, so Lisa and Charlie volunteered to take Dean to his ultrasound screening. Of course, when Sam found out, he insisted he go as well. 

The technician moved the machine across Dean’s belly, and the black and white images looking vaguely like a baby moved with it. It was hard to believe that that was what was inside Dean. 

“Do you want to know the sex?”

“Yes!” Sam said.

“No!” Lisa and Charlie responded. Sam pouted.

“Sorry, Sammy. Thems the rules. They don’t wanna know.” Dean told the kid. “What the mommies say, go.”

“Are you two his mothers?” The technician asked politely, pointing to the Braedens.

“Us? Oh, no.” Lisa replied quickly.

“I mean, we’re the mothers. Not his mothers though. I mean, were going to be the mothers.” Charlie babbled awkwardly.

“She means that we’re the adoptive mothers. We’ll be adopting Dean’s baby, and we want the sex to be a surprise.” Lisa clarified, patting Charlie’s other hand. 

“Oh.” The technician said shortly. “Well, thank goodness for that.”

“Hey, what the hell is that supposed to mean?” Dean demanded.

“Oh, I meant no offense,” she said. “I just see a lot of young omegas come through here, and it’s obviously a really toxic environment for children.” 

“What the fuck?” Charlie asked, letting go of Dean’s hand.

“ _Charlie._ ” Lisa said warningly. 

“Er, not that you’re toxic, Mr. Winchester. I’m just saying. You’re a single, teenage, omega, who is pregnant. Did you forget to take suppressors that night, or do you just always let yourself go into heat?” The technician started fiddling with her machine. 

Lisa glared up at the technician. “Excuse you? You know nothing about Dean. You know nothing about his situation. Who are you to judge?”

She held up her hands. “I’m not judging.”

“Dean could be a freaking saint, and we could be serial killer nut jobs for all you know.” Charlie told her, standing up to leave.

“Yeah, Dean could have been raped, you don’t know his situation, how dare you act as if he is less than you because he is in the chair and you are the one with you fancy machine. I’m a yoga instructor and Charlie works in IT but for all you know we’re holding him here against his will!” Lisa put in, clearly pissed.

“Yeah, why don’t you go back to night school and learn a real trade before you shit all over a sixteen year old kid for one bad decision, huh?” Charlie finished.

“I uh, I’m going to go get the prints of the baby.” The technician stammered, slamming the door as she left.

Sam burst into laughter. “Wow, I feel bad for anyone that ever treats that baby badly. You two just slaughtered her.”

“Damn straight. Jesus, you guys are dicks, I love it!” Dean laughed.

“Your our birthparent, nobody treats you like shit.” Lisa huffed, and Charlie looked at her proudly. 

Oh yeah, they were the perfect parents for this baby.

***

Afterwards, the four of them decided to go out to lunch. Lisa wanted to go to some vegan place in town, but Charlie and Dean made enough gagging noises that she eventually relented. Sam, who recently decided that he wants to be a health nut, protested silently by giving Dean the puppy eyes. 

“Sammy, shut up about it!”

“I’m not saying anything!”

“Okay, but you’re giving me The Look.” Dean protested. He turned to the Braedens who were sitting in the front seat. “Guys, if this baby inherits Sammy’s puppy dog eyes, you’re screwed whenever it wants something. It’s gonna want a pony and you’re just going to go out and buy a whole ranch because it’ll give you Sam’s Look.”

“I don’t do that!” Sam scowled. 

The Braedens laughed. “Dean, we want this baby so bad, we’re definitely more than willing to spoil the hell out of him or her.”

“Maybe instead of being like me, it’ll come out with a super deep voice. That would be hilarious!” Sam giggled. 

“Is the baby’s father Darth Vader or something?” Lisa asked, and Charlie look incredibly proud of her. 

“No, but the father does have a ridiculously deep voice. Seriously, the kid’s sixteen and he sounds like he gargles whisky for a living.” Dean laughed.

Lisa raised an eyebrow. “Not that you would know what that’s like, _right_?” 

Dean snorted, and patted his stomach protectively. “Absolutely not. Not recently, anyways.”  
They got to a restaurant they could all agree on (Mexican food, Dean was literally always crazing salsa), fit in snugly into the booth, and for a minute, Dean could close his eyes and pretend that this was his family.

Charlie and Lisa, were honestly the two most beautiful women he had ever seen. Not beautiful in the sort of Angelina-Jolie-I-wanna-get-on-that sort of beautiful. No, these women dazzled Dean, but it was because how in ridiculously in love they were.

Sometimes, when he was falling asleep at night, in that weird middle ground between asleep and awake, Dean could catch little flickers of memories. The soothing voice of his mother singing to him, or the sound of John and Mary lightly teasing each other. He wasn’t sure if they were even real memories, or just dreams, but he knew that the Charlie and Lisa loved each other the way that John and Mary loved each other in Dean’s mind. 

That was why they were so perfect for the baby. 

“So… what’s the birth father like?” Charlie asked, after the waiter came and took their order. 

“Charlie!” Lisa hissed nudging her wife. She looked over at Dean apologetically. “I’m sorry, we weren’t going to ask.”

“Why not?” Sam asked, munching on some tortilla chips. 

The women exchanged glances. “Sometimes… younger omegas… and even older omegas…” Charlie trailed off, clearly uncomfortable.

“I mean, it’s not exactly common anymore, but we weren’t sure, and Dean’s already doing such a beautiful thing for us, that we didn’t want to bring up any bad memories…” Lisa added.

“And well, I asked because you guys mentioned him in the car so I figured it wasn’t, you know…” 

“They weren’t sure if Cas raped me, Sam.” Dean said, remembering how they defended him earlier that day. 

Sam’s jaw dropped. “What?! Lisa, Charlie, Castiel would _never_ do something like that, how could you even think that?” He turned to face Dean, suddenly horrified. “Right?”

Dean rolled his eyes. “Calm down, Sammy. Do you think I would still be talking to the guy if that’s what happened?” Dean knew though, that that wasn’t uncommon for abused omegas.

Sam shook his head vehemently. “No way. But Cas wouldn’t do that!”

Dean sighed, and looked over at the Braedens awkwardly. “Sorry, Bobby and I haven’t exactly gotten around to explaining to the kid that not all omegas are treated nicely.”  
They nodded understandingly. 

Sam blinked hard, and Dean could tell he was trying to hold back tears. “It’s okay. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bring up bad stuff.” He sniffled. “Or cry like a stupid kid. I know that a lot of people treat omegas badly, we learn about equal rights in school and stuff, I just forget sometimes that that includes my brother.”

Lisa reached across the table and rubbed Sam’s arm soothingly. “It’s okay, baby. You didn’t know. But you know what? Dean’s fine, isn’t he? He’s the best situation possible, right?”

Sam hiccuped. “I guess so.”

“I know so. He has a really good brother to take care of him, and Charlie, and me. We’re all going to take care of Dean and make sure he’s okay, right?”

A small smile reach the corners of Sam’s face. “Definitely.”

“Good.” Lisa finished, patting his hand.

Dean stared at her in awe. No one had ever been that gentle with Sam before, except Dean. Charlie noticed his staring. “What?” She asked, cocking her head.

“It’s just… you guys are gonna be great mothers.” He breathed. 

Lisa exhaled. “We hope so.”

***

The drive back to Bobby’s was over an hour, and Sam was out like a baby. Dean ran a hand through Sam’s shaggy head. “Car rides put him to sleep faster than any drug over could.” Dean murmured. 

“You take good care of him.” Lisa said, winking from the rear view mirror.

“Always have.” Dean admitted. He didn’t want to share that he’d been taking care of Sam his whole life, but the Braedens knew that they didn’t live with their parents, so he’s sure they could fill in the blanks.

“Oh! The birth father!” Dean remembered. “I was going to tell you about him.”

“You don’t have to.” Charlie said, “I’m sorry we were poking at it.”

“No, it’s totally cool.” Dean shook his head. “We’re best friends, me an’ Cas.”

“Just friends?” Lisa asked, teasingly.

Dean glanced over at Sam, to make sure he was definitely asleep. “Well… sometimes I think there’s more to it, but I’m never really sure.”

Charlie and Lisa nodded understandingly. Just because an alpha and omega had sex, doesn’t mean anything. 

Dean shifted uncomfortably. There was something he had been curious about ever since he saw a framed wedding photo at their house. “Can I ask you something?” 

“Sure, Dean.” Lisa said.

“Why are you guys-? I mean, you’re mated, right? But why get married on top of it? I mean, what’s the point of getting married if you’re already bonded for life?”

Charlie shrugged. “What can I say? I wanted her last name.”

Lisa rolled her eyes and sighed exasperatedly. “Dean, we’re both betas, so we can’t have children together.”

“Right, that’s why you’re adopting this little guy.” Dean patted his stomach.

“Or girl.” Charlie corrected.

“ _Anyways_ ,” Lisa said, clearly annoyed by both her partner and Dean, “we tried adopting before, and we wanted the child to come into a home where we were married. We could all just be one big family.”

“It ties us together.” Charlie reached for Lisa’s hand.

“Right, it ties us together.”

The Braedens grinned at each other, and for a moment, Dean was pretty sure they had forgotten he was there. 

***  
Now, don’t ever let it be said that Dean doesn’t _try_ with Cas’s family. Standing at the front door of the Novak’s house, he stood there while Dean’s mother looked at him unimpressed.

“Is uh… is Cas home?” Dean asked, shifting from one leg to the other.  
Naomi Novak stared at Dean’s bulging stomach, and raised an eyebrow. “Yes, is there any particular reason why you need to see him?”

Dean forced himself to not roll his eyes, and smiled politely. He had gotten Bobby to promise to not tell Cas’s mother that Cas was the father of the baby, despite Cas’s protests that he could handle it, and the fact that all of his siblings pretty much knew. Uh, uh. No way. Naomi was a fierce lady, and she already didn’t like Dean because he was poor and atheist, there was no way that she would accept the fact that Cas impregnated him. 

“Just wanted to hang out for a bit.” 

“I’ll go see if he’s available.” Which was code for, _you can hang out with him but I hate your guts and you’re not good enough for him._

Dean followed her up the stairs, past the pictures of all of his successful siblings hanging on the walls. Michael at his Yale graduation, a picture of Anna working with poor helpless children in Africa, Zachariah at his business. Apart from Gabriel, who lives down the street and has been working at a gas station his entire life, all of Cas’s brothers and sisters lived great and important lives, and Cas was sure to follow in their footsteps. 

Which of course, meant that Dean was not a good choice in friends, according to Naomi. 

Dean brushed past Naomi to get into Cas’s room, where he found him reading on his bed. 

“Hey, man.”

Cas smiled at him, and set down the book. “Dean.”

Dean awkwardly maneuvered himself so that he could sit in Cas’s old beanbag chair. His room was painted light blue, and covered with track trophies and medals, posters of famous scientists, and a bookshelf. Not a single movie post in sight. 

“You’re getting pregnant-er these days,” Cas pointed out, dumbly.

“Yeah. That’s very true. I had an ultrasound a few weeks ago, and the baby’s all healthy and shit, so that’s good.”

Cas nodded. “I’m glad. Have you talked to the adoptive parents much? The Braedens?”

“Dude, totally! They’re so cool, Cas. Charlie does all this IT work, but only because she gets bored in the day, but she makes hella bank designing websites and stuff. And Lisa’s a yoga instructor, so you know that baby’s gonna be really healthy.”

“I’m glad.”

Dean pushed himself off the beanbag chair, and sat next to Cas on the bed. “Y’know, I’m gonna get really huge, soon.”

“I know that, Dean. That’s why I bought out Walmart and Target’s supply of large t-shirts.”

Dean chuckled. Of course he did. “Yeah, I know. Thanks for that.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Are you still gonna think I’m cute when I’m giant?” He fidgeted, he hadn’t meant to ask Cas that, yet somehow it slipped out anyway. Dean knew that he was an attractive guy, but his level of attractiveness already dropped when he started showing. How long would it be before he started looking like Hagrid?

“I always think you’re cute. I think you are the most beautiful person alive.” Cas said, earnestly. 

Well, he hadn’t been expecting that. Shit. Dean’s heart twisted, and he tried not to say something stupid. 

“Uh, thanks, dude.”

“M-maybe we could get the band back together, after this whole thing is done?” Cas asked, switching topics drastically. Freshman and sophomore year, they had been in a shitty garage band with their friend Garth.

“Dude, totally! I just need to restring my bass, and we’re solid.” Dean loved how Cas could switch topics so quickly and they could just slip easily into a completely different conversation. That was cool. 

“Maybe uh. Perhaps we could get together again, too.”

Dean blinked. Like, them _together_ together? Was that a thing?

“Were we together?”

Cas shrugged, picking at a string on his bed. “Once. At Missouri’s. And uh, in your bedroom, when I got you the shirts.”

There was nothing Dean wanted more than to be with Cas, but that was so totally a bad idea, he could even think about it. Cas was going to go off to some Ivy League college and save the world, and Dean’s going to drop out of a state school. That’s all there was to it. 

“What about Hael?”

Cas wrinkled his nose. “I don’t like Hael.”

“Come on, she’s pretty. She’s super rich too, I heard her parents own property on the Grand Canyon.”

“You can’t own property on the Grand Canyon, Dean.” Cas said, rolling his eyes.

“Hael can.”

***  
If there was one place Dean hated on the entire planet, it was the mall. Sure, there was food there (that made him nauseous), and hot people (which he couldn’t be bothered to oogle), but he happened to be a guy that had a particularly embarrassing group of friends. 

“Now, this is probably the best pretzel I’ve ever eaten.” Cas declared, munching on a mall pretzel. 

Dean glared at his best friend. “Hey, are you gonna share the love there, sweetcheeks?”

“Uh, I paid for it,” Cas teased.

“Yeah, and you knocked me up. I need to feed the little parasite you gave me!” Dean retorted, shoving Cas.

“If you quit flirting, I’ll buy you your own pretzel, Dean.” Jo said, standing in the middle of the two. “Nobody wants to see that.”

Benny chortled. “As if you could get these two to knock off their flirting. Please!”

Jo nudged the football player in the ribs. “I mean, they’re practically mated.”

“We are not!” Dean protested hotly. “I just want a bite of his damn pretzel, that’s all. Jesus.”

“Yes you are, brother. You two got it bad.”

Cas stayed silent, blushing profusely. He ripped off a piece of his pretzel, handing it to Dean.

“Thanks for the support, Cas.” Dean muttered, popping the pretzel in his mouth. 

The group made their merry way to the food court, to find Dean his very own pretzel, when they ran into Lisa. 

“Dean?” She asked, grinning. “How are you?”

Benny raised his eyebrows, and Jo made a couple of suggestive remarks. 

“Uh, hey Lisa. I’m good.” He said, and after looking around and realizing that his friends thought that Lisa was a different kind of friend, he added, “Babies coming along great!” And patted his belly for good measure.

“Oh yeah, that’s Lisa Braeden, one of the adoptive mothers!” Jo realized. Oh yeah. Dean sorta had the picture from the adoption website printed out and hanging on his wall in his room. Of course his friends would recognize her. 

“Are these your friends?” She asked, awkwardly. Clearly she could handle one teenager, but several, and she was uncomfortable. 

“Benny Lafitte.” Benny said, sticking his hand out to be shook. “Dean’s best friend.” Lisa shook his hand awkwardly, clearly unsure of what to think of Dean’s little posse. 

Jo scowled, and shoved him over a little to introduce herself. “That’s actually a lie, I’m his best friend. Hi, I’m Jo. Is it true you guys are hella loaded?”

Jesus, his friends were embarrassing. 

“They’re all my best friends, thanks guys.” Dean said, more to his friends than Lisa. Cas waved awkwardly. She was clutching several bags labeled Baby Gap, and he realized that she was shopping for the baby.

“How are you feeling?” Lisa asked.

“Happy? Oh! You mean like, physically. I’m good. My stomach like, exploded, look.” He lifted up one of his new shirts Cas had bought him (AC/DC, thank you Cas) to display his popped out navel and ever growing stomach. 

The baby seemed to disagree with being put on display, because it started kicking up a storm.

“Son of a bitch. Thanks David Beckham.” Dean winced.

Lisa looked worried, and she stepped forward. “Are you alright?”

Dean shrugged. “Your kid likes to kick. All day, it just kicks.”

She reached forward, but seemed to think better of it and stopped herself. “Do you think I could uh, feel it?”

“Are you kidding? Come on over. Everyone’s always grabbing my stomach at school. I’m a legend, they call me the Cautionary Whale.” He grabbed Lisa’s wrist, and placed her palm on his bare belly. 

After a few moments, nothing happened- the baby had stopped kicking. Lisa looked discouraged, but kept her hand firmly placed over Dean. 

Benny and Jo had gotten bored, and wandered off. Only Cas remained, watching the whole scene expressionless. Dean looked over at his friend, who was standing several feet away, almost as if he was trying to slink into the background. He gestured for Cas to come closer.

Lisa was crouched down in front of Dean, both hands on him, completely distraught. “Dean, I don’t feel anything.” She moved her hands around frantically. “It won’t move for me.”

Dean didn’t know what to say. The baby was constantly moving for him, it just was. It was rare for there to be a moment when it wasn’t moving. Kid’s gonna grow up to be a mosher, Dean was sure of it. 

“Uh, I’ve heard that if you speak to it, it’s more likely to move.” Cas spoke up. “You should try talking to it, introduce yourself.”

Without glancing up to see who was talking, Lisa stared at Dean’s belly with absolute concentration. “Hi baby. My name’s Lisa. I’m going to be your mommy.”

Dean gripped Cas’s hand, and smiled at him gratefully. Despite being awkward and terrible at talking to people outside of Dean, Cas still managed to understand how to handle situations like this. 

“I’m so excited for you to be born. Dean’s a really good man, and he’s going to give you to a good home. Your other mommy Charlie, she’s really happy, too.” Lisa cooed. “We’re gonna love you, and cherish you, every single day. You’re going to be so happy.”

Then, as if the baby was trying to fist bump his new mom, the baby started moving. “Oh my god! It moved, Dean! I felt it!”

“Told you, it never stops moving.” Dean said. 

Lisa looked up, searching for whoever gave her the advice. She made eye contact with Cas, and grinned. “Thank you, it worked perfectly.” Her eyes slide down to where their hands were intertwined, and she raised an eyebrow.

“I’m Lisa Braeden, who are you?” She asked, sticking out a hand for him to shake. 

He let go of Dean’s hand, and shook hers awkwardly. “My name is Castiel Novak. Pleased to meet you.”

“Oh! You’re uh, you’re the father!” She realized. “I’m so glad I could meet you.”

Cas tried to smile pleasantly, and Dean tried to stop himself from chuckling at the guy. He opened his mouth to speak, but Lisa threw herself into his arms and hugged him tightly. “You and Dean are doing a beautiful thing, thank you.” 

Cas patted her back, looking completely unsure of himself. “Dean said that you and your wife will love and adore this baby, and you have just proven yourself.”

See, if anyone else on Earth had said that, they would get weird looks and laughed at. When Cas says it, it means something. Apparently Lisa agreed, because she nodded at him, teary-eyed.

“We just really want a baby.” She confessed.

Cas placed a hand on Dean’s stomach, something he hadn’t done since their makeout session, months ago. They hadn’t talked about it since. “And you will have one, soon.”


	3. Spring, Part 1

Lisa Braeden stepped back and admired her handiwork. Charlie Braeden, on the other hand, was less than impressed.

“They’re both yellow,” she said, staring at the two swatches of paint drying on the empty wall. Lisa had been in a flurry recently, attempting to make the nursery perfect for the baby, despite the fact that it wasn’t due for another two months.

Lisa mock-gasped. “Charlotte! I am surprised at you! One of them is custard, and one of them is mustard. This is a huge deal for the baby.”

Charlie rolled her eyes, and rose to tip-toes to smack a kiss on her wife’s cheek. “I’m sure baby Hermione will love the room no matter what color we paint it, babe.”

It was Lisa’s turn to roll her eyes at her wife. “Uh, we are _not_ naming the baby Hermione.”

“And why not? Hermione was a badass! You don’t want our baby to be a badass?”

Lisa squinted at the paint. “What if it’s a boy? We can’t name a boy Hermione.”

“No way! If it’s a boy, we’re naming him Harry.”

Her wife sighed. “What if we named it something non-Harry Potter related? And not Leia, I know all about your little crush on her.”

Charlie blushed, and peeked at Lisa out of the corner of her eye. “Okay then, you can name this one, and I’ll name the next one. What do you got?”

“I’ve shown you my list, right?” Lisa asked, heading towards their bedroom.

“You made a list?”

Lisa plopped down on their bed, and opened the nightstand drawer. She held out a yellow notepad, filled with scribbles and question marks.

“I know we’ve been talking about it for a while, but I got bored one night while you were playing D&D, so I came up with my top favorites.” She said, suddenly shy. 

“‘Lisa and Charlie Braeden’s Baby Name Idea,’” Charlie read. She looked up at her wife. “‘Our Baby.’ I like the sound of that.”

Lisa gestured for her to continue, so she cleared her throat. “If it’s a girl: Katelynn, Jessica, Madisyn, Marissa…”

“Do you like any of those?” Lisa asked, leaning over her shoulder to look.

Charlie shrugged. “I don’t know. Can I tell you something? I don’t think it’s going to be a girl.”

“Really?” Lisa asked, wrapping her arms around Charlie’s waist.

Charlie ignored her wife’s advances, and continued. “Yep. I’m certain that Dean’s having a boy. I just know it.”

Lisa tucked a strand of Charlie’s short red hair behind her ear, and kissed just underneath. “Then pick a boy name you like.”

“‘Xander, Dylan, John… no we can’t name him John, that’s Dean’s father’s name.” Charlie corrected.

Lisa continued to kiss down her neck, and Charlie shuddered. “Babe…” she whined.

“Pick a name.” Lisa whispered, cupping her breast..

“What about… oh! I really like that one.” She said, pointing to the last one on the list.

Lisa licked up her neck, agonizingly slow. She glanced at the list “Oh! That’s actually… that’s actually perfect.”

***

Fucking shit, Dean was always _hungry_. Like, that stereotype about teenage boys being always hungry? That already applied to Dean before he got knocked up, and now it’s twice as bad. Standing in the lunch line, he shoved the nachos he had already grabbed to make room for chowder, three soft pretzels, and a burrito. 

Benny stared at him in horror, as he set two slices of pizza on his tray. “Brother, how many months has it been now? You’re getting huge.”

“It’s honing in on eight.” Dean said, and oh, sweet merciful Jesus, there’s applesauce. “You wouldn’t believe how weird I look naked.”

Benny snorted. “I can imagine.”

“Imagine what?” Jo asked, as the two sat down at her table.

“What I look like naked.” Dean said proudly. 

“Well, I know one person who doesn’t need to use their imagination.” Jo teased.

It took Dean didn’t even need to ask what his friends were referring to, their shit-eating grin usually reserved for when they made fun of his stupid crush on Cas, made it obvious. “I hate you guys.” He muttered, cheeks burning. 

Jo and Benny burst into laughter. It’s not that funny, god. Why do they always laugh at shit that isn’t that funny?

“Jesus, Dean. Eight months later, and you’re still turnin’ redder than a tomato about it!” Benny joked, clapping him on the back. 

“Eight months later and you still won’t shut the fuck up about it.” Dean said, darkly. 

Well if Dean was being honest, no one had really shut the fuck up about his situation. In a high school that used to ignore him, he was suddenly the unwilling star of the show. Teachers regarded him stiffly, girls snickered about him when he walked past.

Even when he wasn’t at school, he found that people were assholes to him. Once, while picking up some groceries for Bobby, a family walked past and he very distinctly heard the mother sniff, “See kids? That’s why if any of you turn out to be omegas, we’ll make sure we can _afford_ suppressors.”

It was freakin’ depressing, is what it was.

“Did you hear Cas is going to prom with Hael?” Jo asked, seriously. 

Dean’s neck snapped up, and he stared at her. “Hael? Pfft. No way.”

“No, it’s true.” Benny said, slurping his chocolate milk. 

“It’s probably a pity date.” Dean shrugged. “She’s so weird.”

“I heard _he_ asked _her_.” Jo said. 

That was such bullshit. Dean felt unnecessarily angry. Who was Cas to take some girl to the prom he didn’t even like? Cas was horrified at the idea of taking her when Dean brought it up, so it’s actually kind of ridiculous that he would do that. 

From across the cafeteria, Dean could see Hael smirking at him. What a bitch! 

Dean scarfed down the rest of his food, and heaved himself out of his seat. 

Jo rushed up to help him with his backpack, but he waved her away. “I’m fuckin’ fine, Jo. Leave me alone, Jesus.”

Jo flinched, and held her hands up apologetically. “Wow, sorry.”

He sighed. “No, shit. I’m sorry. I snapped. I’m kinda pregnant and bitchy, right now.”

She smiled understandingly, and patted his stomach. “You’re a little convex, I understand, homie.”

He nodded, and waddled away. Who did Cas think he was? What, was he just going to start dating some girl he didn’t even like? And Dean definitely knew that Cas didn’t like her. Not only did Cas practically gag at the idea of dating her, but Dean knows Cas. She’s not Cas’s type.

Dean was furious, that he didn’t realize that he was marching up to Cas, right up until he practically walked into the guy. He was shuffling books out of his locker and into his bag when he turned around to see Dean.

“Are you really going to prom with fuckin’ Hael?” Dean demanded.

“Uh, hello Dean.” 

“Jo said you’re going the the prom with Hael. Since when did you even give a shit about prom? I thought we were going to watch movies or something that night.” They never actually made plans to that, but somehow it had been Dean’s image of his prom night since forever.

Apparently that wasn’t Castiel’s idea of the perfect prom night, because he titled his head in confusion and said, “Yeah, I asked her if she wanted to go.” After a long pause he added: “We’re getting a stretch limo and Hael wants us to wear blue.”

Of course they’re wearing blue. Blue would look fucking fantastic on both of them. It’s gonna make their creepy pale skin and bright eyes stand out more, and everyone’s going to be dazzled by them. Dean could see them going to prom together, looking absolutely perfect together. They’d dance really close, and Hael would lean in, and whisper in his ear. And Cas, Cas wouldn’t even realize that she’s flirting with him, until she kissed him. Then, Cas would realize that he is in love with her, and they’d go off to the same college next year, and get married and have a big, religious wedding and Naomi Novak would be so happy that her son’s dumb omega friend that got knocked up lost contact with him.

“Your mom must be really glad you’re not taking me.” Dean huffed.

Cas’s eyebrows wrinkled, and he rested his hand on Dean’s shoulder. “You’re upset. Why are you so upset?”

“I’m not upset.” Dean said, flinging his backpack on the floor. “I’m freakin’ fantastic! I’m-I’m... _awesome!_ ”

“Dean.”

“I mean, everyone keeps making fun of me, and now everyone knows I’m a shitty omega, and I’m stuck looking like Kevin James, but other than that, I’m fine.”

“I don’t know who-” Cas started, but Dean waved it away.

“I know you don’t know who Kevin James is because for some reason, knocking up your best friend isn’t against your religion, but watching movies is! Anyways, have fun at your shitty prom with Hael.” 

Dean started to lean over to grab at his bag, when Cas said, “You’re being very immature.”

Dean dropped his shit and narrowed his eyes. “What?”

“You have no reason to be mad at me, Dean. You told me to date Hael, and when I invited her to go to the prom with me, you explode. It’s really immature.” Cas tried to stay cool, but Dean could see a fire behind his eyes. He vaguely wondered if Cas would hit him, but Cas probably had some sort of “no hitting pregnant people” rule. 

“Plus, you broke my heart.” He added, bravely.

“Why? Because I forgot to take my fuckin’ birth control and was horny? Because we were bored and had sex and I didn’t want to mate with you for life?” Dean was spitting out absolute lies at this point, and he was pretty sure they both knew it. 

“I wasn’t bored.” Cas snapped. “It meant something to me, and you know that. I told you it did, and I wouldn’t lie to you.” He looked irritated, but calm. It was the sort of quiet rage that Cas had, reserved for when he was truly angry. He tilted his head to the side, and got very close to Dean. “You clearly wanted to be friends, so that is what I was for you. Now I don’t see a point in even that.”

Dean felt like he had just been punched in the stomach, and this time it wasn’t the baby. 

“What the fuck ever, Cas. Take Hael to your shitty prom, fall in love, whatever. Actually, knock her up too, while you’re at it.”

Cas started to say more, but the bell rang, and Dean was pushing his way through the moving students, stomach boldly leading the way. 

***

He left. He couldn’t help it. He hated being at his school, where he felt itchy and people stared at him and the baby kicked whenever he saw Cas. He felt trapped and like a caged bird, flew.

It took him a while to realize that he was driving towards the Braeden’s home, but by the time he got onto the freeway, it was too late to turn around and he decided he was going to stick with it. 

He pounded on their nice, probably freshly painted door frantically, and Charlie threw it open, eyes widened. “Dean? What’s wrong? Come inside.” She ushered him in, taking his backpack and leather jacket from him. Her eyes flickered to his stomach and then back up to his face, before Dean finally assured her that yes, everything’s fine. 

Dean sighed. He’s an idiot. Here he was, showing up at Charlie’s house in the middle of the day, a month before the baby’s born. Of course she assumed the worst. Jesus.

“I should go.” He said, pulling his jacket back on. 

“Dean, did you…? Don’t you have school?”

“Yeah. I skipped.”

Charlie nodded. “I see. Let’s go sit, shall we?”

She led him into the living room, and helped him sit down on the sofa. She came back in with some water for Dean, and sat on the coffee table across from him.

“What happened?”

“Can we not talk about it? I shouldn’t have come here, I’m sorry. I should have just gone home and napped or went to the movies like a normal teenager.” Dean said, running his hand over his face.

“You’re not a normal teenager.” She reminded him. 

Normal teenagers don’t get pregnant. 

“Here’s the situation: you’re having my kid in like, four weeks. I need that kid to be happy and not stressed out when it comes, so I can dress it up in cute clothes. In order for that to happen, I need _you_ to be happy and not stressed out.”

She hopped off the coffee table, and started sorting through their DVDs “Now, here’s what we’re gonna do: I’m not going to send you back to school or call Bobby, and because I’m going to be the cool mom, we’re going to watch movies until you’re better or willing to talk about it. Which ever comes first, preferably both.”

She popped a movie out of it’s case, and slid it into the player. After snuggling up next to Dean and throwing a blanket over the two of them, pressed play. This is how Dean found himself watching Harry Potter with his kid’s mom. 

Harry Potter had never really been his favorite, it was always Sammy’s thing, but Charlie seemed really into it, and soon they were discussing who belonged in what house. 

“See, I’m a Ravenclaw and always have been. I’m hoping the baby will be Ravenclaw too, but I’ll love it no matter what.” Charlie said, and Dean looked at her like she was crazy.

“You… you know that it’s not real right? Sorry Charlie, but I’m definitely giving birth to a muggle.” He patted his stomach lightly. 

“No, but you can still sort people. Like Lisa. She’s such a little Hufflepuff. Always taking care of people and sticking up for her friends.” Charlie had a sparkle in her eyes, the way she usually did whenever she talked about Lisa. 

“Oh, okay. Sammy’s a Ravenclaw.” He decided. “He’s pretty smart.”

Charlie shook her head. “Nope. Gryffindor.” 

“What? You can’t just sort my own brother better than me!” Dean protested.

“Remember how you told me about him always fighting with your dad? How he always stood up to him whenever he knew that he was right? _Total_ Gryffindor. That kid may be smart, but friendship and bravery is way more important to him.” 

Dean knew that she was right, but refused to admit it. “Okay, I need to just like, practice more. My friend Cas- he’s _definitely_ a Ravenclaw, I don’t care what you say.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I dunno… he’s really smart. Like, crazy smart. He’s probably going to be a professor at Harvard or something like that. He’s super creative with his intelligence, too. Like, he’s good at physics and all that shit I could never understand. Charlie, he makes up math formulas for fun.”

Charlie nodded. “He could be a Ravenclaw, yeah. I don’t know him well enough to tell.” 

“Also, he runs all the time. Every day, he runs. I mean, his brother Gabe told me that he got up an hour early on Christmas so he could get a run in. _Christmas_ , for Christ’s sakes. Who does that?” He realized that this point he was just babbling about the guy, and it had nothing to do with sorting. 

“Hey, isn’t he the father?” 

Dean tried to not blush, but failed, miserably. “Uh, yeah.”

Charlie beamed at him. “Lisa told me about running into you guys at the mall. He loves you.”

It was such an expected thing, that Dean sputtered. “He-uh? He what? No! No, we’re just friends. We uh, we had sex and all but we’re just friends.”

The older woman shook her head, still smiling. “Nope. Lisa told me. She saw the way he looked at you, and she came home and said ‘Charlie, that boy is in love with our Dean.’” 

Dean couldn’t listen to this. He wanted to get in his car and run away again, but he was heavy and his feet hurt and the blanket was warm. 

“He can’t love me.” Dean said, finally. Charlie opened her mouth to speak, but stopped when the sound of a key being shoved into the door rang through the air. 

The door swung open, and Lisa charged in, holding several bags. “Charlie, I picked up some more baby clothes. I’m amazed and how easy it is to find gender neutral clothes-” she stopped when she saw Dean.

Dumping her stuff on the floor, she rushed to the couch, panicking. “Dean? What happened is the baby-?”

“He’s good.” Charlie said, placing a light touch to Dean’s middle. “Just visiting.”

All the tension in her face rushed away, and Lisa sighed gratefully. “Thank god.” She plopped down on the other side of Dean, forcing him to move over and make room. This effectively placed him in a Braeden sandwich, locking him in. 

“We were just talking about how in love the baby’s father is with Dean.” Charlie said brightly.

“Oh! Dean, the two of you are adorable.” Lisa said, snuggling into his side. “When I ran into him at the mall, he was such a sweetheart. I could practically see hearts in his eyes.”

Okay, she’s definitely just saying that because Cas helped her with getting the baby to kick, but Dean let it slide.

“Are you two…?” She asked, letting the question trail in the air. 

Dean shook his head. “No. We’re not. We’re not even friends anymore. I pissed him off today.”

“Is that why you came here?” Charlie asked, rubbing his stomach comfortingly.

Dean shrugged. “I guess.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Lisa asked.

Dean shook his head again. “No. I just want to forget it.”

Lisa threw her arms around Dean, and pecked him on the cheek. “It’ll all be alright, Dean. You didn’t see the way he looked at you. You may have thought that my mind was all on the baby but I saw enough.” She looked over at Charlie, who was still rubbing circles on his belly absentmindedly. “He looks at you the way I look at Charlie.”

Charlie smiled at her brightly and said, “Sap.” But when Lisa placed her hand on top of hers, she let it stay. 

Dean felt warm and comfortable underneath the blanket, and in between the Braeden’s, but he felt like this was a private moment for the family, and he was somehow and intrusion. 

“Dean, this baby is so important to us.” Lisa murmured. “You’re giving us the most beautiful gift.”

“I-I know that.” Dean said. 

“Dean, Lisa had three miscarriages before you came along.”

Dean didn’t know what to say to that, so he placed his hand over Charlie’s and Lisa’s, still laced together over his stomach. He squeezed, and they both smiled at him, sadly. 

“I had no idea.” Dean knew that they had tried adopting in the past, but this was completely different. 

“We don’t usually like to talk about it.” Lisa admitted. “We wanted a baby so badly, and you came along, out of nowhere.”

“It’s just… we want you to know how important you are to us.” Charlie finished. 

Dean blinked. He had never been important to anyone, before. 

After the movie ended, Charlie suggested that they go out to eat. They ended up going to a small, family run pizza parlor in the middle of nowhere. Then again. The Braeden’s lived in the middle of nowhere. Rich people nowhere, but it was still nowhere. 

Dean munched on his pizza and imagined the baby growing up eating there on the weekends. His eyes trailed over the cheap red wallpaper and boring art. Maybe it would go on it’s first date there. Eat there with all of it’s friends after school, and before homecoming. Hell, Dean would probably never eat pizza in this little hole in the wall again, but it might be one of his baby’s favorite places in the world. 

Dean looked over at the two beautiful women eating pizza and laughing, and he knew that they weren’t his family. Soon, their baby would be born, he would hand it off, and never see any of them again. 

He set down his pizza. “Hey guys, I’m gonna… I’m gonna go. School’s been out for a couple of hours now, and Bobby’s probably gettin’ kinda worried.”

They waved him off, much more engrossed in each other. He grabbed his keys, and headed to his car, dreading the hour-long drive home. 

***  
When he pulled up into Bobby’s house, his heart stopped. There, parked perfectly next to Bobby’s old beat-up truck, was a 1967 Chevy Impala. John Winchester’s pride and joy. 

His father was home.

Glancing down at his bulging stomach, he muttered “Well, at least you won’t have him as a grandfather.”

Wrapping himself protectively in his old leather jacket (that was technically his dad’s anyways, and couldn’t even be zipped because duh, pregnancy) he dragged himself through the front door. 

Sam was sitting in the living room doing homework, and when he saw his brother he jumped up, wide-eyed. “Dean. _Dad’s here._ ” He whispered. 

“I know, Sammy. I saw the Impala.”

“You boys can cool it for a sec, he’s asleep upstairs.” Bobby called from the kitchen. 

The brothers both breathed a sigh of relief, and Bobby came into the living room, grim. “I take it you’re not too pleased that your daddy’s home?”

“Not in my present condition.” Dean said, glancing down at himself.

Bobby snorted. “Color me impressed. John’s messed up way more times than he can count. He’s not gonna jump down your throat over this.”

“He wasn’t too excited when I called him.”

The mechanic pushed himself into his chair, and looked up at his boys from beneath his hat. “I ain’t gonna lie to you, this is gonna be messy. John’s gonna say some nasty things. You’ll probably say some nasty things back, and I won’t deny that he probably deserves a lot of them. But just… try. Try and make it pleasant?”

“This is the first time he’s been here in years. What the fuck is he even doing here Bobby?” Dean demanded.

Bobby looked sheepish. “I think he’s uh, here for the baby shower.”

Dean blinked “I’m not having a baby shower.”

“He means that Dad’s here because of the baby.” Sam said, looking to Bobby for help. “He said that he wants to like, be here for you.”

Dean shook his head. “I don’t believe it.”

Bobby held up his hands, like he didn’t believe it either. “It’s true. Your old man showed up here this mornin’ after you left for school-which I know that you skipped by the way, I’m not stupid-saying that he’s here for the big show.”

“He wants to… support me? Hold my hand and cry when I pop it out?” Dean asked, shocked. 

Bobby shrugged. “More or less. He’s sleeping upstairs, I let him have my bedroom, but he’ll be up in the morning.”

That wasn’t something Dean wanted to deal with. He felt bone tired, and after glancing at the clock hanging on the wall, he decided that being pregnant was a good enough excuse to go to bed at seven-thirty. 

He tossed his backpack on the floor of his room. Maybe he’ll also use his pregnancy as an excuse to not do his homework all weekend. Most of his teachers had been pretty light with his school work, and he’s pretty sure it has more to do with his little friend under his shirt, than his charming personality. 

He kicked himself out of his jeans, (jeans that Jo’s mom had sewn stretchy fabric in the waist band so he could still fucking wear them) and waddled over to his bed and collapsed. 

He was opening his phone and texting Cas before he could even stop himself, but before he could press ‘send’, it light up with a phone call.

“Hey, babe.” Dean said. “Great minds, huh? I was just about to text you.”

“Dean.” Cas said, and sounded about as tired as Dean felt.

“I’m sorry. I know you’re pissed off at me.”

Cas sighed, and Dean wanted nothing more than to see him face to face instead over the phone. 

“You left school. Jo said you weren’t in 6th period.”

“Oh yeah,” Dean said sheepishly. “I left after we uh, talked.” 

“Where did you go?”

“Charlie and Lisa’s. I hung out with them for a while.”

“Is that… is that normal?”

Dean sighed. “Probably not. Hey, guess what?”

“What?”

Dean bit his lip. “My dad came home.”

Cas was silent for a beat, before asking, “How did it go?”

“He was asleep when I got here.” Dean pulled the comforter around his body tightly, and stared up at Robert Plant, forever frozen in time in the same pose. Dean wished he could freeze sometimes, too.

Cas waited for Dean to say more, so Dean added, “I haven’t even talked to him since I told him that I’m pregnant, and that was four months ago.”

“Do you want to come to my house, tomorrow?” Cas said, swiftly changing the subject. Dean grinned. Of course they weren’t going to talk about their argument, that’s not how they worked. 

 

The last time they had fought was the summer before sophomore year, when Dean had complained about “Bible-thumpers”, forgetting that Cas was a fan of the Bible, himself. 

“Oh, shit.” Dean had said. “I’m sorry Cas, I forget.”

“Yes, you do that a lot, don’t you?” He had said coldly, and left his house. Four days later, Dean called him and told him that Bobby was taking him and Sam camping, and that Bobby said he had to invite Cas. Cas went on the trip, and their argument was forgotten. 

And now, they were doing pretty much the same thing. “Dude, I would love to. I’ll probably fight with my Dad for like, twenty minutes tomorrow morning, and then come over and cry.” Dean said it jokingly, but they both knew that had a very strong possibility. 

Dean hung up with his friend, and shifted, trying to get comfortable. Not that that would happen, Dean was never comfortable these days.

***

He woke up the next morning to an intense pressure in his bladder. He groaned. Seriously? He had gotten up to pee like, twice last night. It was like those commercials where the old lady has to get up and leave during a family event to pee twenty times. Dean felt like that lady.

He laid in bed and listened to the sounds of his home. The creaks and moans of the old rickety house that had become his first real home. He could hear Sam showering down the hall, singing quietly. The news was loudly playing downstairs, but he could tell that Bobby and John weren’t listening to it. It was an old trick of John’s, turning up the radio or TV to blasting loud, drowning out whatever he didn’t want everyone else to hear. Whatever he was saying to Bobby, it was just for Bobby.

Eventually, he heard the shower stop, and the pipes clinked inside the walls. He waited until he heard Sammy throw the door open and thud back to his room, before slipping out of bed and going to relieve himself. 

He toddled back into his room, slipped on some sweatpants, changed his t-shirt, and decided to face his father head-on.

He stopped at the top of the steps for a moment to listen.

“Well is Sammy an omega too?” Dean heard his father say.

“Don’t know, John. He hasn’t shown any signs of what he is yet.” Bobby said. “Doctor says it should happen any day now. Dean was a late bloomer, too.” 

 

The third step in Bobby’s house always creaks, and as soon as Dean’s foot touched it he heard Bobby and John’s hushed voices stop. 

“Mornin’!” He called. 

“Mornin’!” Bobby called back.

When he entered the kitchen, John peeked over his coffee cup to side-eye Dean, but stayed silent. Cool, two could play at that game. Dean pretended that he didn’t see John, and fixed himself a bowl of cereal. 

“Do you want me to make some breakfast, son?” Bobby asked, and Dean shook his head. 

“Cereal is good enough, thanks though.”

“You probably should eat a healthier breakfast than that,” Bobby admonished. Dean shrugged.

He set his bowl down directly across of from John, looked him square in the eye, and sat down. 

“Dean, don’t you think that you should be getting a good breakfast in your...present condition?” John said, speaking for the first time since Dean entered the room.

“I’ll eat at Cas’s.” He said, nonchalantly. He turned to Bobby, “By the way I’m goin’ over to Cas’s today. He’s gonna help me study for that test.” There wasn’t a test, but Bobby seemed to understand.

“Who the hell is Cas?” John asked, raising an eyebrow. 

“ _My friend_.” Dean said stiffly. He was hoping his tone of voice would mean _drop it_ , but John certainly didn’t receive the message. 

“He’s not the father, is he?” 

“He happens to be, yes. Don’t worry, it’s not like he can knock me up, twice.” Dean knew that he was being much more mouthy than he usually was with his father, but he found himself not actually giving a shit.

He slurped his cereal in silence, and when he was done, he dumped his bowel in the sink and left. “I’m out!” He called, not really giving either of them a choice.

He heard John say something as he slammed the screen door shut, but he couldn’t bring himself to go back and find out what that was.


	4. Spring, Part 2

_It started when he woke up one morning, feeling like absolute and utter shit. His head was throbbing. It felt like his skin was being stretched too thin, and everything was so, so hot._

_“Bobby..” he croaked. Of course, his voice was hoarse, and he couldn’t get anyone’s attention. Did he get drunk last night? No, he hadn’t been drunk since he came to live with Bobby last year. What did he do last night?_

_Oh yeah, he was super horny last night. Like, more than usual for a thirteen year old. Holy shit, he was so incredibly horny. He came home from Cas’s house with a embarrassing boner, that he immediately fled to his room to take care of. Ten minutes later, he had another one. He had stripped himself dry, and he still couldn’t stop touching his damn dick._

_What the hell?_

_Bobby came into his room eventually, probably to ask why the hell he wasn’t up yet for school. He stopped in the doorway, and scrunched his nose. “Hell, boy. You coulda said something.”_

_“What?”_

_“You’re in heat.” Bobby said, before turning to go. “I’m getting you some supplies.”_

_“Supplies?” Dean squeaked. “That’s impossible, I’m gonna be an alpha.”_

_“Obviously not.”_

_“But… but I can’t be an omega! Winchesters are always alphas!” Dean whined. He squirmed around in the sheets. Despite his horrible headache, he was still half-hard, and his skin itched._

_“We’ll put you on suppressors and birth control if you want it, but for right now, you’re gonna have to suffer through it.” Bobby said, a touch of sympathy in his voice. “You’ll be fine.”_

_Dean didn’t understand. Cas had already presented as an alpha, and Dean was convinced that he was going to show any day now, too. John was an alpha, his mother was a beta. It didn’t make sense for him to be an omega._

_“I think I’m just sick, Bobby. Can’t you get me some Advil?”_

_Bobby shook his head. “That’s not gonna do you a lick of good, Dean. I’m sorry. I’ll call the school and tell them you’re out for the week, and then run down to the store and get you what you need.”_

_“I don’t need anything Bobby, I’m fine.” He wasn’t fine. Everything was hot. He could feel liquid squishing between his legs and no matter how hard he tried to pretend it wasn’t there, it was definitely there. “I’m gonna be an alpha, or at least a beta, like you.”_

_“Dean, be reasonable. It smells slicker than prom night in here. You’re miserable, don’t make it worse for yourself.” Bobby folded his arms, in his no-nonsense posture. “I know this isn’t what you wanted, but this is what’s happening.”_

_With that, the man shut the door to Dean’s room, leaving him in his misery._

_It wasn’t fair, he wasn’t supposed to be an omega, he just wasn’t. Now John would never want him back._

***

Dean had long given up trying to ride his bike, partially because Cas was terrified that he was going to somehow hurt the baby, partially because it made him exhausted. Instead, he walked the mile and half it took to get to Cas’s house, wrapping himself in his jacket that could no longer zip around his middle.

The snow had melted away, leaving giant puddles in it’s midst. Even so, it was still fucking cold out and he probably should’ve asked Bobby to drive him, but he couldn’t stand another moment in that house, not with John staring him down with a million questions to ask. 

Turning the corner to Cas’s street, he saw a car pull out of the garage and drive in the opposite direction. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that the car only had Naomi in it, meaning that Cas was still home. 

When he knocked on Cas’s door, Gabriel answered, looking less than impressed. He blocked the doorway, eyeing Dean up and down. “Come back to break more hearts?”

Dean rolled his eyes. “Move, Gabriel.”

Gabe unwrapped a lollipop that Dean’s pretty sure came out of thin air, and stuck in his mouth.

“He went out for a run.” 

“Then I’ll go wait for him, upstairs.” Dean pushed past the man, and waddled up the stairs to Cas’s room. 

Honestly, what was Gabe even doing there? He was twenty-something years old, and despite being the assistant-manager of a successful gas station, he still lived at home. Well, Dean was pretty sure he had his own apartment, but he was home so often to visit his family, that he might as well live there. Sometimes Dean wondered if Gabriel only visited specifically when no one else was home, just for the free food. 

Dean opened the door to Cas’s room, and was disappointed that yes, Cas was gone. Gabriel was telling the truth. 

He sat down on Cas’s unmade bed, kicked off his boots and shrugged out of his jacket. He dumped both of them on the floor, and stretched out on the bed. Cas said that he could come over in the morning, but he didn’t specify when. 

Glancing over at Cas’s alarm clock, he saw that oh, it was only 8. Of course Cas was out running still. 

His eyes trailed across the room, looking at the posters and decorations. He had a whole shelf dedicated to trophies and awards. Half from track, and half from science fairs and school competitions. How did Cas manage to be smart and athletic? It wasn’t fair. 

Cas’s room was freezing, so it made sense for him to pull the comforter up over him and attempt to get warm. 

The pillow was orange and smelled like Cas. It was nice. 

***

“Dean?”

“Mmm…?”

Oh _shit._

Dean sat up, and Cas was standing in the doorway of his room, holding his sneakers. He crunched noisily on what was probably orange tic-tacs, and smiled goofily. 

“Did you wake up, come straight here, and then fall asleep in my bed?” Cas asked, although it was pretty fucking clear what the answer was. 

Dean grinned. “Of course.”

“I’m still mad at you.” Cas told him, dropping his shoes and sitting down next to him.

“I was an asshole.” Dean admitted. 

“You’re still an asshole.” Cas retorted. He scooted his butt until he was resting against the headboard, and pulled the blankets over his legs. “I didn’t do anything to deserve you attacking me yesterday.” 

Dean sighed like he always did when Castiel was right.

“I’m having a baby.” 

“Yeah, _my_ baby.” Cas grouched.

But it wasn’t his baby. It wasn’t Cas’s baby any more than it was Dean’s. It didn’t feel like their baby. It belonged to Lisa and Charlie, and no one else. 

“Are you… you’re not still mad that I’m giving it up?”

Cas’s face softened. “No, I was never mad.”

“Oh.”

“So, your dad.” Cas prompted, smoothing changing the subject. He peeled off his sweatshirt, revealing a plain baby blue t-shirt underneath. 

“Talked to him for about three minutes, and then I left.”

“What’d he say?” Cas settled under the blankets, maneuvering his body until he was laying down. “Sorry if I smell bad, I was just running.” He added, as if it wasn’t obvious from his bright red sweatpants and running shoes. Actually, he smelled like most delicious combination of cold air, sweat, and musk. If he concentrated hard enough, Dean could even smell the tangy aroma of artificial orange. He settled in next to Cas, shoulder to shoulder, and breathed him in.

“The usual shit. I left before it could get too heavy. He just.. he just pisses me off, you know? Like, who is he to say that I’d be a shitty parent?”

“You’d be a great dad, Dean.” Cas murmured, running fingers through Dean’s hair.

Dean blinked. He’d never discussed wanting to be a parent with anyone before. Everyone seems to assume that he’s going to end up alone, but Dean had always secretly imagined himself with children, even before he presented as an omega.

“I… you’d be a great dad too, Cas..” 

Cas smiled at him, and then his eyes flickered to Dean’s stomach. He reached out tentatively, before resting his hand on Dean’s stomach. “I always thought you and I were going to mate.” He confessed.

Dean felt his mouth go dry, and looked anywhere but at Cas. He settled on staring at his belly, where Cas’s hand currently lay. 

“What made you think that?”

Cas shrugged noncommittally. “I don’t know, I just did. I guess whenever I pictured my future, I pictured you right there beside me. Isn’t that what mates are?”

As if to agree, the baby kicked.

Cas patted Dean’s stomach, and removed his hand. “Someday, you’ll mate with someone and have more children, and the two of you will be great parents.”

Dean didn’t understand why Cas sounded so resigned, like he had given up. Dean had never pictured a future with Cas, because he didn’t think it was possible. He had always assumed that Cas would go off to some big college, and leave Dean behind. Cas would go on to be a writer or a professor or a physicist, and Dean would go to community college and work at Bobby’s shop. That’s all that there was for him.

***

After lazing around and eating half a box of hot pockets with Cas, Dean eventually went home. He spent the rest of the afternoon napping, before waking up to the smell of baked beans. 

He followed his nose down to the kitchen, where the rest of his family was already settled in to eat. 

Bobby handed him a plate, and Dean sat directly across from his father, just as had done that morning. He eagerly dug into his food, and Bobby and John exchanged glances.

John coughed awkwardly, and broke the silence. “Dean, once the baby’s born, I’m taking you and Sammy with me.” 

“What?!” Sam exploded, from across the table.

“You can’t do that!” Dean protested. He looked to Bobby for help, but he only shook his head.

“Yes he can, boy. I never officially adopted you or anything, so legally, you’re both his.” Bobby said, in a way that made Dean think that maybe he didn’t necessarily agree with it. Bobby was powerless. 

“That’s bullshit!” Sam declared, pushing back his chair. “I’m really happy here. Dean is too!” 

“Clearly you’re not being taken care of.” John said firmly. “Dean’s knocked up, and you haven’t even presented yourself yet. Some quality time under a good, strong, alpha should help whip you boys into shape. You’ve gotten soft under Bobby.” 

The unsaid words _you’ve gotten soft under a beta_ hung in the air.

“What so now we need to go back and live with you so we can be more _manly_?” Sam cried. “This is unbelievable. I hated living with you, you made our lives so miserable! I like it here. I have good grades, and friends, and Dean has Cas and Benny and Jo and his wrestling team.”

John frowned, and crossed his arms. “I don’t think I asked whether or not you’re happy here. I don’t think I asked _anything_ , actually. We’re staying long enough for Dean to have the baby, and then we’re out.”

“Where?”

Everyone turned to Dean, who, in the midst of all the fighting, had fallen silent. 

“What?” John asked.

“Where are we going?”

“I’m not sure yet.” John said, shifting uncomfortably.

“Well, let me know when you do find out, so I can tell my friends.” Dean calmly ate another bite of beans. He wasn’t going to let John phase him. There was no point in arguing. He had spent his entire time at Bobby’s wondering if his dad was ever going to come back for him, and here he was. 

Cas was going away to college after they graduated, anyway. It was okay. Dean can spend his life travelling with his dad, and helping Sam get ready for the same big places Cas would go. Maybe he could stay in contact with Cas, and visit him every couple of years. They could stay friends.

But Dean didn’t want to stay friends with Cas.

It’s funny how much you can be away for so long, and spend the entire time missing home, but when it comes time to go back, you realize you’re already there. 

Why was he trying so hard in the first place to stay friends? He wanted Cas, and Cas wanted him, right? He’d made it pretty clear.

_“I guess whenever I pictured my future, I pictured you right beside me.”_

Dean never pictured a future with Cas, because he never allowed himself to. What if he wanted to stay and graduate high school? Maybe he could even go to college. Fuck that, he could even go to the same college as Cas, if he really wanted to. 

He didn’t want to uproot his life. He was happy here. He had Benny and Jo, and he’d never had more than one friend like that, before. He was getting C’s and B’s in all of his classes, actually, he even had A’s in a few of them. Coach Turner told him that if he got into shape over the summer, he could be back on the wrestling team his senior year. He had a life here.

“I’m seventeen years old.”

“I…what?” John asked, turning his attention back to Dean. He had gone back to arguing with Sam, but now his attention was back on Dean.

“I’m seventeen. Actually, my birthday was a few months ago, thanks for the card you sent.” Dean said, sarcastically. 

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Bobby flashing a subtle smile. 

“Dean, you know I’m busy-” John started.

“Yes, I do know that you’re busy. Too busy for us. You know who’s _not_ too busy for us? Bobby. Bobby took good fuckin’ care of us while you were off doing god knows what! It’s not his fault I got pregnant, it was mine. But he’s been here supporting me the entire time, unlike you. You don’t get to come in here and sweep us away just because you feel guilty!”

Dean had risen to his feet during his speech, and John stared, wide-eyed.

“Fuck this.” He spat, grabbing his keys. “Good luck with your shitty kid, Dean.” Dean didn’t have time to remind him that he was giving the baby up for adoption because immediately, John rose from his seat and started towards the door.

Bobby stood up. “John, wait.”

“No, Bobby. Thanks for raising my kids, I guess.” And with that, he slammed the screen door shut. 

Sam looked absolutely delighted. “Dean, you stood up to Dad!” He hugged him lightly, careful of the baby.

Dean turned to Bobby, worried. “Is that okay, Bobby?”

Bobby clapped him on the shoulder. “Son, it’s more than okay.”

It was okay. He could live with Bobby. He could graduate high school, he could-

He could be with Cas.

“Hey, Bobby, do you think you could help me with something?”

 

***

Dean winced as the bell on the door proudly announced his arrival, and the gas station’s assistant manager whirled around and beamed.

“Dean-o! What brings my favorite brother-in-law to my humble shop? Not here for a pregnancy test, I assume.” The man asked. He turned to Sam, who was trailing behind Dean, carrying several grocery bags. “Sammy! Good to see you buddy!” 

Sam stuck his tongue out at Gabriel, and Dean felt a swell of pride. “Only he gets to call me that,” he muttered. Dean patted his back. Good boy. 

Gabriel hooted with laughter. “Okay, Sammy, whatever you say. Hey, is Dean here to buy you your first porn?”

Dean sighed. Why did Gabriel have to be on shift? He just wanted to pick up what he needed and go, not be harassed by Cas’s brother. This was only his third stop, and he still didn’t have enough. He hoped that Bobby, Jo, and Benny had picked up enough to fill the entire thing.

“Gabe, man. I need your help.” Dean said, hoping he could skip the antics. 

Gabriel’s ears perked up, and he leaned in, conspiratorially. “Oh?”

“Okay, but you need to keep this shit to yourself. No telling Cas.”

“Mum’s the word!” He promised.

“So, I need some tic-tacs.”

***

Monday morning, Cas trotted down the stairs, stretching his arm. Naomi was already at work, and Gabriel was sitting on the couch with two different kinds of poptarts, grinning. 

“Why do I get the feeling that you poisoned our entire family?” 

“Excuse me?” Gabe asked, mockingly offended. “I would never.”

Cas scoffed. “You did something. Why are you grinning at me like that?”

Gabriel munched on his poptart and cackled obnoxiously, crumbs flying. Cas wrinkled his nose. Why was his brother so gross?

“So, that Dean Winchester.” Gabriel prompted.

Cas raised an eyebrow. “That Dean Winchester.”

“He’s in love with you. I’ve decided that I now approve.”

Cas laughed, humorlessly. 

Gabriel frowned “Wait, haven’t you been outside?”

“I just woke up like ten minutes ago, no.”

Gabriel brightened, and jumped off the couch. “Oh, so you haven’t seen it! Go look!” He pushed Cas towards the door, despite his protests that he still needed to eat take his vitamins before his run.

Gabe wasn’t having it, and he pushed him out the door. 

The door slammed behind him, and he nearly tripped over the welcome mat, which was folded over, with something written in smeared chalk poking out. He carefully stepped around his front porch, and picked up the mat. He tilted his head at the message: 

**I see myself by your side, too. -DW**

Underneath it, an arrow pointing to his yard.

Cas whipped around, to see a large cardboard box sitting at the edge of his driveway. He jogged to the box, and unfolded the top.  
Filling to almost the top, were hundreds and hundreds of boxes of orange tic-tacs. His heart leapt. _Dean._

Castiel lugged the box back to his house, kicking the mat back into place on his way it. Gabriel looked up smugly from his place on the couch, and raised an eyebrow. “Well?”

Cas chuckled. “So, that Dean Winchester.”

***

“Dean, you’re being ridiculous about this. And stop chewing on your fingernails.” Jo said, smacking Dean’s hand out of his mouth. 

Benny patted his shoulder. “It’ll be fine, brother. Y’all are both crazy about each other.”

“I can’t do this.”

His heart was beating rapidly, and he was pretty sure he was sweating literal bullets. He hadn’t been this nervous since well, the night he got pregant. What if Cas had changed his mind about how he felt? What if he what he was saying was just a result of Dean carrying his baby, like some sort of alpha instinct kicked in, but would disappear once the baby was out of the picture?

Jo snorted. “If you weren’t pregnant, I’d probably punch you. You already put his favorite thing in the entire world besides you on his front steps, and wrote a sappy note. Now all you have to do is go get the girl.”

Dean’s hand fluttered to his stomach protectively. 

This was it. He had left the box on Cas’s driveway early in the morning, and now he’s going to go find it. Cas had been spending most of his lunches running out on the track, so that’s where he undoubtedly would be. 

“If he wanted to see me, he’d come find me.” Dean protested. 

But Jo and Benny weren’t having it. The pair continued to walk towards the track, leaving Dean to waddle behind them. “C’mon, Winchester, let’s go.”

Dean found Cas standing with some other track kids, bending over to stretch. Dean stood in front of Cas, and waited for him to look up. 

Cas smiled down at Dean’s boots, and rose up to meet him.

“I received an interesting package today.” Cas said casually. His friends waved to him, and jogged away.

“Oh? Did you? Was it Harvard, begging you to attend their school?” 

“Oh no, that was last week.” Cas winked. 

Cas smiled at him crookedly. Dean shuffled for a minute under his gaze, and then felt a slight pain in his abdomen. 

“The baby’s kicking, look.” He grabbed Cas’s wrist, and placed his palm over his belly.

Cas looked pleased, and he reached over to press a kiss to Dean’s forehead.

“So, I think I’m in love with you.” Dean blurted.

Dean’s pretty sure he’s never seen Cas smile that big. “You are?” His eyes crinkled, in a way that made him look much older than seventeen, but no less gorgeous. 

“Yeah. And I’m sorry I was such a dick to you, you didn’t deserve it. I was so convinced that there was no way we could be together, that I didn’t stop to think why.” Dean searched for Cas’s hand, which was resting on his belly. He laced their fingers together, and dropped their hands to his side.

“Also you’re so ridiculously smart. Like, I’m pretty sure all the other smart kids hate you, because you’re so goddamn intelligent. And hot. You’re crazy hot. Like, I can’t believe you would even want to be with me, much less mate with me, or even have sex with me. I wake up every day just flabbergasted.”

Cas rose an eyebrow. “Flabbergasted?”  
Dean shrugged. “You know what I mean. Anyways, can we make out now?”

“Yeah.”

Cas wrapped his arms around Dean, and leaned in. 

***

From the bleachers, Jo smacked Benny’s arm. “Look, they’re doing it!”

“Finally!” Benny hooted. “I can’t believe it took them this long!”

Jo was pretty sure she had never seen her two friends look happier, but she couldn’t resist embarrassing them. “Y’know, I’m pretty sure you can induce early labor doing that!” 

Without breaking away from Cas, Dean presented her his middle finger.

***

Things settled in pretty quickly after that. Making the transition from best friends to boyfriends was so easy for Dean. Instead of thinking about how much he wanted to kiss Cas, he could just lean over and kiss him. Instead of getting embarrassed and denying it when people made jokes about his crush on Cas, he could smirk and say, “yep, I’m pretty into him.”

As it turns out, nobody was surprised. Anyone Dean would have to tell had already been in on the whole “buy out the entire city’s supply of orange tic-tacs and put them in front of Cas’s lawn” seduction plan (although, they hadn’t actually had sex yet, apart from the one time that got them in this whole mess in the first place), so Dean didn’t really have anyone to announce his relationship to.

They were too young to mate, as mating was a ritual that wasn’t done until people were in their mid-twenties, but there was nothing stopping them from dating. 

Back in the day, when omegas had about as many rights as children and livestock, mating happened as young as the omega’s second heat; the parents would find a suitable mate after the child presented, and eagerly wait for their second heat. 

Nowadays alphas and omegas mated of their own accord, when they felt ready for it. True, many people found the one that they want to mate with years before doing the actual mating-but some people mated fairly young, and then married a few years later as a formality. 

Mating was a conscious choice, but Dean couldn’t see himself mating with just any alpha that John or Bobby picked out for him. Sure, he could probably go along with it if he needed to, but he wouldn’t like it. 

One afternoon, while watching TV, Sam turned to Dean and asked him if he wanted to mate Cas.

Dean shrugged. He didn’t really expect the question to come up. They were watching an old Star Trek rerun, and it had just gone to commercial, when Sam turned to Dean and blurted it out.

“I don’t know, Sam. I’d like to.”

Sam bounced excitedly in his seat; you would have thought Dean had just told him that they were going to Disneyland or something. “Are you gonna get married?”

Dean nudged his brother with his foot. “Jesus, Sam. We’re still in high school. I don’t think we’d even mate until college.”

“But what about after? I mean, if you mate, you’re gonna be together forever anyway. You guys should do it right away!”

Dean patted his belly. “Uh, I’m not doing anything until this little sucker comes out, so you can put the  
‘congratulations’ card away.” 

Sam nodded. “I know! I’m just really happy for you.”

Dean smiled. He was pretty happy for himself too.

***

One Saturday, Dean was waiting for Bobby to drive him to Cas’s track meet, when he felt a rush of water in his pants. 

“Uh, Bobby…?”

Silence. 

Shit, he wasn’t going into labor, was he? He eyed the calendar hanging on the wall. The little box that was circled in red and said “DUE DATE” on it wasn’t for another eight days. He was having the baby early? Was that allowed?

“Bobby!” He hollered again, attempting to sit up in bed. “Hey, Bobby!”

Oh god, Bobby was in the garage. 

“Sammy!” 

Sam poked his head in Dean’s room. “What, Dean? Why are you yelling?”

“Uh, either I pissed my pants…”

Sam’s nose wrinkled. “Or…?”

“Or what do you fuckin’ think! Go get Bobby!” Dean said, exasperated. 

“Oh!” Sam said, looking relieved. He dashed down the stairs, and as Dean sat up in his bed, he could hear Sam yelling “Bobby! Dean’s going into labor!”

***

Dean decided not to tell Cas that he was going into labor. He was still at his track meet, and Dean didn’t want him to worry.

He did however, call Jo and Benny.

One time, he crashed his bike while messing around at a skate park. He was thoroughly convinced that he could ride it on the half-pipe, despite having zero experience with it. It may or may not had something to do with trying to show off for a certain athletic alpha. Well, it turned out just as you would expect, and Dean ended up with two cracked ribs and a fractured leg. It hurt to breathe for days.

Being in labor was way worse. It fucking sucks. Dean wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.

Of course, once they drugged him up, things were a little better.

***

Once the procedure was done, Dean felt a little empty. The doctor’s had cleared out, and there was an air of stillness in the room. Jo and Benny went down with Bobby and Ellen to get some lunch from the cafeteria, and he was left alone with Sam.

He pulled a chair up the hospital bed. 

“Dean, I’m so proud of you.” Sam told him, admiringly. 

Dean scoffed. “All I did was lay there while the doctors cut me open. Doesn’t take much work.”

Sam smiled at him, like maybe that wasn’t what he meant.

“No, you know what I mean, Dean. Not just having the baby, but everything else, too. Giving it up for adoption, standing up to Dad, telling Cas how you feel. You’re the most amazing person I know.”

Sam reached down and squeezed his brother’s hand. “You’re my hero.”

The two brothers looked up when they heard the sound of sneakers squeaking frantically through the hallway, and suddenly there was Cas, standing in the doorway. 

“Hey.” Dean said.

“You didn’t call me.” Cas said, accusingly. 

“You had a meet.” Dean replied. “And there wasn’t anything you could have helped with, y’know? Besides see me all gross and stuff.”

Cas’s face softened, and he stood there helplessly. “Yeah.”

Sam patted Dean’s hand, and stood up. “I’m gonna go track down some jello.”

“Don’t choke and die on it.” Dean offered. 

Sam shrugged. “I’m in a hospital. Best place in the world to choke, I suppose.”

He left the room, and Cas sat down in Sam’s place. 

Dean suddenly couldn’t contain himself, and felt a sob escape his lips. Fuck, he was crying. Cas looked panicked, and placed a hand on the top of Dean’s head. It was probably really gross for him, Dean was sweaty and sticky. Cas carded his fingers through Dean’s hair, and tried to smile.

“So, you had a baby.” He said, conversationally.

Dean choked out a laugh. “Oh yeah, didn’t you hear? I slept with some guy and got pregnant.”

“Yeah, it’s all over twitter, right now.”

Cas stood up, and for a moment, Dean thought that he was going to leave, and panicked, “Don’t go.”

But then Cas was slipping into the hospital bed on the other side of him. Dean pushed himself against him, and Cas wrapped an arm around his waist.

“Is this okay?” He murmured. 

Dean wiped his face. “Yeah, but we probably shouldn’t have sex in here. Don’t wanna traumatize the nurses.”

Cas chuckled, low. “I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to have sex right after giving birth, Dean.”

“Oh god, I don’t want to have sex either. I feel awful.” Cas pulled Dean in tighter, and placed a sweet kiss on his ear. 

They held each other for a while, and it felt nice. It felt like home. 

“The nurse said we could go see the baby if we wanted.” Dean said, “Up to you.”

Cas shook his head. “I don’t really want to. It doesn’t feel like ours.”

Dean understood what he meant. Sure, it was their baby biologically, but it didn’t belong to them. They wouldn’t be it’s parents.

“Besides, we’ll be here again, on our own terms.” Cas added.

Dean smiled. “You want kids with me, Cas?”

“Of course. I told you, you’re my future.”

***

Outside the maternity ward, two women stood side by side, looking through the glass window. 

Lisa clutched Charlie’s hand. “Which one do you think it is?” Charlie asked. Lisa shook her head, silently. Her eyes brimmed with tears, she couldn’t believe it. 

A nurse poked her head out. “Are you two ready to meet your son?” 

“We have a son?” Lisa squeaked.

The nurse raised an eyebrow, clearly not amused. “You ladies are the adoptive mothers, right?”

Charlie and Lisa nodded frantically. “Yes, yes we are.” Charlie confirmed.

“We have a son.” Lisa breathed. “We have a son, Charlie.” 

The nurse led them in, and took them to a baby, swaddled tightly in white. She handed him to Lisa, who leaned into Charlie, instantly. 

The baby had bright green eyes, and he looked up at the two women curiously. 

“Hi, baby. We’re your mommies.” Lisa cooed. 

Charlie reached over and set her palm on the side of his head. “Hi Ben.” She whispered. “We’re going to take such great care of you.”

Outside the ward, a thirteen-year-old boy looked in. In a different lifetime, that baby would be his nephew, and he would be it’s uncle. He would take it to the park when his dads needed a day off, and help him with his homework. 

Charlie, who was still standing behind Lisa, glanced over her shoulder. Sam smiled at her, and she fixed him with a look.

_I’m a mom,_ it said. 

Sam waved, before turning and turning and walking towards the cafeteria. He knew he would never see the three of them again.


	5. Summer

Wandering into the garage, Dean set his essay down, and leaned against the counter as we waited patiently for Bobby to emerge from under the car he was currently working on. 

Bobby rolled out from underneath the car, and glanced at Dean. “You going to Cas’s?”

“S’that okay?”

Bobby reached over and wiped his hands on the rag that had been previously lying on the ground. “Bring him over for dinner tomorrow and it is. I never get to see you anymore, ‘cuz you’re always with that damn boy.”

“Yeah well, I like that damn boy.” Dean said, a faint blush touching his ears. 

Bobby smirked. “Yeah, I know.” He scooted back onto the board, and rolled under the car. “Hand me that wrench.”

Dean handed him a wrench.

“Not that wrench.”

Dean swallowed his smart-ass reply with a chuckle and handed Bobby the right one. He shuffled for a moment, unsure if he was dismissed to go.

“So, you gonna tell me what those papers are for?”

Dean froze. “Oh, that.”

Bobby harumphed. “Yes, that. It’s not as if you’re doing homework, there’s no school. What’re you up to, boy?”

He was going to surprise Bobby, but it was as good a time as ever. He took a deep breathe.

“I’m having Cas read my college essay,” he explained. 

Bobby immediately rolled out from underneath the car, and sat up. “You’re applying to college?”

Dean nodded. They had never talked about it before. He had always just assumed that he’d work for Bobby his entire life, or back when he was still hoping his dad would pick him up, with John. 

“I know it’s really expensive, but I plan on paying for all of it, which is why I’m going to start applying for jobs, too. I mean, I’ll still make time to work at the shop, so don’t worry about that. But I think that Gabe will give me a job at the gas station, and if not, maybe the McDonalds is hiring… and I know that there’s lots of scholarships available nowadays and Cas said that there might even be some for omegas who were teen parents like me-” Dean’s babble was cut off by Bobby standing up and pulling him into a hug. 

“Boy, I’m so damn proud of you.” Bobby said, and if he look a little misty eyed, Dean wasn’t going to say anything. 

“So it’s okay? I know it’s gonna cost a lot, but my grades really improved last year, so…”

Bobby shook his head. “Kid, I thought I’d never hear you say those words. Whatever you wanna do, we’ll make it work. Now go enjoy your summer.”

Dean grinned, and grabbed his bike. Jesus, he was glad he could ride his damn bike again. True, he didn’t usually ride it in the winter anyway, but it felt good to have the warm sunshine beat down on his back as he pumped his legs. 

He rolled into Cas’s front yard just as he was getting the mail. He looked up when he saw Dean and broke into an absolute grin.

“Hello, Dean.”

Dean slowed down and stuck his foot out in the street to stop his bike. “Heya Cas.” He ditched his bike in the front yard and followed Cas out the the backyard.

They folded together on the old recliner, stuck back near the shed after Dean had left it in Cas’s yard earlier that year. It was much easier, falling together like this. Dean pulled out his essay, from his backpocket. He unrolled it and presented it to Cas.

“What is this?” Cas asked.

“My application essay!” Dean said proudly. “It’s only a state school, and I don’t even know if I’ll get in, but I want you to read it.”

Cas took the essay from Dean, and he handled it like he was something absolutely precious. Dean fidgeted nervously while Cas read over his paper, picking at the hem of Cas’s shirt, and biting his lip. Cas soothingly rubbed Dean’s knee, and it helped calm his nerves some. 

He had worked pretty hard on his essay, but he wasn’t sure if it was exactly what colleges were looking for. The prompt was to explain the biggest challenge he’s overcome. Most kids probably wrote about a parent dying, or their siblings having cancer, right? Dean’s probably looked stupid in comparison. 

“Well…?” he asked, once Cas finally looked up. “It’s shit, huh? It’s probably shit. I’ll rewrite it a bunch.” He reached for the essay, but Cas snatched it back. 

“Dean,” he breathed. His eyes glistened. “Don’t you dare. Sure, there’s a few grammatical things I would fix, or maybe some rewording, you get a bit repetitive at the end, but other than that-keep it.”

“Are you sure? Sammy helped me a little bit.” Dean hadn’t written about anything like the samples he had found online. He never had some sort of learning disability or was abused, so he couldn’t whip out anything profound like other kids. 

“Absolutely. They’ll love it. _I_ love it.” Cas leaned over and kissed Dean on the lips sweetly. 

“What needs to be fixed?” Dean asked.

Cas ran inside to get a pen. Dean watched his future mate go inside, and grinned to himself. Heh, future mate. He loved the sound of that. Dean was going to mate with Cas someday. 

He looked over his essay again while he waited. Okay, Dean could see what Cas meant. Maybe what he had written was pretty good. Or at least okay. He closed his eyes, leaned back in the recliner, and felt the warmth of the sun beat down. 

He was going to be okay. 

 

***

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“My Biggest Challenge”  
By Dean Winchester

When I was six years old, I decided that no matter what, I was going to be an alpha. My dad had been an alpha, and he told me that omegas were weak, meant to be ruled by the big strong alpha. It was ingrained in me that the only way I would be acceptable, would be if I could make my dad proud.

Well, as fate would have it, at thirteen I presented as an omega, just weeks after my best friend Cas became and alpha. I was less than thrilled. As my Uncle Bobby would say, denial isn’t just a river in Egypt. I spent my first heat insisting that I was simply just sick, and that as soon as I got well enough, I’d become an alpha.

I didn’t want to be an omega, so I did my best to act as alpha as possible. Flirt with anyone with a heartbeat, act tough, get in fights, the works. It didn’t do me a lick of good, because when I turned sixteen, I slept with Cas and got pregnant. 

I started this essay thinking that I was going to tell you all about how giving up the baby for adoption was my biggest challenge, but really, it wasn’t. Giving up the baby was easy. Well, I won’t say easy, but it wasn’t my biggest challenge.

No, my biggest challenge was learning to accept myself. Sounds cheesy, I know. But it’s true. Everyone had been telling my for years that Cas was in love with me, but even after we had sex, I was still convinced that I wasn’t good enough for him. I was a dumb omega, who could barely pass his classes. He was Castiel Novak: track star and science geek, destined for great places.There was no way I could be more to him than a friend and a good screw.

The adoptive parents of our baby, Charlie and Lisa, they loved each other despite their flaws. Lisa was a control freak, and Charlie couldn’t stand organization. If they could love each other, flaws and all, then maybe I could learn to love myself, flaws and all. Maybe Cas loved my flaws, too. 

Well, now I _know_ that he does. And I love his. 

The baby is going to grow up happy, and now, I am too. I’m not just some dumb omega, I’m Dean Winchester. I’m funny, sometimes even smart, and I care about people. I care about myself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! 
> 
> Stay tuned for my camp counselor!AU, coming next month.

**Author's Note:**

> sarcasticallysassy.tumblr.com


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